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SKETCH 



OF THE 



MILITARY SYSTEM 

OF FRANCE, 

COMPRISING SOME OBSERVATION ON 

THE CHARACTER AND DESIGNS 

OF 

THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT 

TO WHICH IS ADDED, 

AN INQUIRY INTO THE PROBABLE DURATION OF 

FME^^ POWER. 



J 



AK.MATI TERRAM EXERCENT, SEMPERQUE RECENTES, 
CONVECTARE JUVAT FREDAS ET VIVERE RAPTO. 



'Baltimore: 

PUBLISHED BY EDWARD J. COALE. 

Benjamin Edes, printer. 

1812. 



^3\ 



i. ^i i 



lint 



IwAfHlNOTONjj 



ADVERTISEMEIST, 

BY THE PUBLISHER. 

THE following essay was written about the 
close of the year eighteen hundred and ten ; some 
curtailments and additions were made in May, 
eighteen hundred and eleven. Although the sub- 
ject of which it treats, has been already discussed 
by very able writers, yet the publisher is induced 
to believe, that this pamphlet will be found to be 
both instructive and interesting. It appears to 
be the production of a gentleman who has thought 
much on " the weighty matters of state" and 
knows how to communicate his thoughts with en- 
ergy and correctness. It is presumed it will 7iot 
be improper to add, that in so critical a period as 
the present, works not written under the influence 
of sectarian or factious politics, taking liberal 
and extensive views of the present state of affairs 
in Europe^ with suitable deductions therefr'om, 
cannot be uninteresting to the American reader^ 
and may contribute to tlie public weal. 

As the author's residence is remote from the 
press, and he had no opportunity of examining 
the proof sheets, the ptiblisher hopes the reader 
will excuse any errata he may discover. 



SKETCH OF THE 

Military System of France^ ^c. 



1 HE history of all ages exhibits no 
. series of events, rapidly succeeding, and grow- 
ing out of each other, so interesting, so sin- 
gular, and so important to the human race, as 
that, which, during the last twenty years, has 
been displayed on the theatre of Europe. To 
all the purposes of political experience, the po- 
liticians and statesmen of the present age have 
already lived through many centuries. The les- 
sons of political wisdom need no longer be 
soughtin the voluminous histories of other times | 
they have all been repeated^ they have all been 
impressed on the minds of wise and reflecting 
men, and with all the charms of novelty to re- 
commend them, in this age of marvellous events. 
The sudden and enormous increase of the 
power of France, within the last few years, has 
amazed and confounded the wisest and best-in- 
formed politicians. On the continent of Asia, 
abounding in extensive plains, with but few W> 



G 

tufal impediments to the progress of a conqueror, 
and peopled for the most part, by semi-barba- 
rous slaves, living under the worst possible 
forms of government, conquests, as rapid and 
extensive as those of France have been by no 
means infrequent. The slaves of an Asiatic 
despot have but few motives, and of course but 
little inclination, to resist the arms of an invader. 
It is, to them, a matter of small importance, \^he- 
ther their rights shall be trampled on by a native 
or a foreign tyrant. But that the rough and 
mountainous regions of Europe, peopled by a 
race of men at once civilized and warlike, living, 
for the most part contentedly, under govern- 
ments, some of them free, and the rest too well 
acquainted with their real interests to tyrannize 
over their subjects, should fall so easy a prey to 
the sword of a conqueror, that the apparently 
strong and well-compacted monarchies and re- 
publics of that quarter of the globe should be so 
easily and so quickly overturned, would a few 
years since have been considered beyond the 
verge of possibility. Never, in any age before, 
have the warlike nations of that continent been 
subdued in such rapid succession ; never, before, 
has ambition there advanced, with such giant 
strides, towards the attainment of its ends ; ne- 
ver, before, has so great a fabric of power been 
there so suddenly reared. 



An inquiry into the causes of this sudden 
and portentous increase of the power of France, 
would possess, at this time, pecuUar interest ; 
inasmuch as that power is still in its zenith, and 
still threatens to prostrate the nations which yet 
retain their independence. Such an inquiry, in 
its fullest extent, the writer of these pages would 
gladly institute, were he not persuaded that the 
development of all those causes would be an 
undertaking too great for his talents, his know- 
ledge and his leisure. He attempts not a work 
so far beyond his power. 

But because his powers are not competent to 
the attainment of a great object, he will not, 
therefore, leave a small one unattempted. The 
maxim " Aut Cctsar, aid nullus,'' in which it is 
hard to say whether arrogance or indolence pre- 
dominates, shall not in this case, be the rule of 
his conduct. BeUeving the peculiar miUtary 
system of France to be one among the leading 
causes of her sudden aggrandizement, he will 
endeavour, with the powerful aid of one of the 
best writers whom this age and country have 
produced,* to develop the organization, struc- 
ture and character of that terrible engine of con- 
quest ; and in doing so will make such remarks 

* Mr. Walsh, who is generally understood to be the au- 
thor of the article in the Edinburgh Review, from which 
copious extracts will by and by be made. 



8 

oh the " genius and dispositions" of the govern- 
ment of France as the subject may suggest. He 
will then proceed to inquire into the probable 
duration of that power, which has " so fatally 
triumphed over the liberties of Europe ;" which 
already extends its views of conquest to the re- 
motest quarters of the globe ; which charmjs the 
nations to destruction with its deceitful smileSj 
or terrifies them with its frowns. 

Horrlbili super aspectu mortalibus instans.— Lucret. 

In pursuing this latter inquiry, he will suggest 
other causes which have contributed to elevate 
revolutionary France to that *' bad eminence" 
<m which she stands. 



From the establishment of the feudal monar^ 
chies in Europe until towards the commence- 
ment of the thirteenth century, the feudal militia 
was the only species of military force employed 
by the states of that continent. But in the lapse 
of seven centuries, a change in the manners of 
the European nations rendered necessary a cor- 
responding change in the prevailing military sys- 
tem. The people were weary of the oppres- 
'Sions and vexations which it inflicted on them ; 
the prince, of its inadequacy to the production of 
an efficient military force. By general consent 



pecuniary grants* from the people to the pniice 
were substituted for the render of mihtary ser- 
vices, and armies of mercenaries, kept up in 
time of war, but disbanded at the return of 
peace, suppUed the place of the feudal militia. 
Standing armies were, in that age, unknown in 
Europe. When the turbulent passions which 
produce violence and bloodshed among men, 
had been soothed by the triumphant, or quelled 
by the disastrous issvie of a conflict, the shat- 
tered remnants of war were disbanded, the sol- 
dier whom the sword had spared, was restored 
to his family and his friends ; the state was no 
longer oppressed with the burthen of his main- 
tenance. A new state of things was now to 
arise, produced by the employment of merce- 
nary armies instead of the feudal militia. 

In the feudal monarchies the authority of 
the prince was confined within bounds so ex- 

* It is worthy of remark, that these grants of money, 
from the people to the prince, in lieu of military services, 
were the commencement of that system of taxation, which, 
in modern Europe, has been carried to such excess. From 
the close of the fifth century, till the commencement of the 
thirteenth, the sovereigns of Europe derived scarcely any 
revenue from their subjects by taxation. Their ordinary re- 
venue consisted of the rents of the royal domains, of the 
profits arising from the custody of the temporalities of the 
church, and of the lands of their military wards, and of se- 
veral other small particulars, all which together defrayed the 
ordinary expenses of the government. In time of \var, the 
armies were raised, equipped and supported in the field at the 
■expense of the individuals who composed them. 



JO 

ceedingly narrow, that he possessed Uttle more 
than the shadow of sovereignty. He was, in- 
deed, the commander of the army during war ; 
but in time of peace he possessed the name on- 
ly, not the power of a king. But though his 
power was small, the liberty of the great body 
of his subjects was not proportionally great ; 
for they were oppressed, insulted and trampled 
on by an arrogant nobility. The feudal states, 
though they bore the name of monarchies, were 
essentially oligarchies of the very worst descrip- 
tion, in which the nobles tyrannized over the 
people, and insulted, and not infrequently im- 
prisoned the king, with absolute impunity. — 
This they were enabled to do by the peculiar 
constitution of those states, which gave them 
the iminediate command of almost the whole 
military force :* for it is a maxim which applies 
to all governments whatever, that the department 
which controls the military force does, in effect, 
possessthe sovereign power. Inthe feudal states 
the prince could not summon the great body of 
the military tenants to arms, but through the 
mediun of the nobility, whose immediate vas- 
sals they were. The power which the haughty 
barons thus possessed, of withholding military 

* Th4 military tenants of the domains of the crown were 
immediately under the control of the prince ; but these were 
few in number, compared with the whole mass of the military 
population. 



11 

aid from the crown, was perverted to the worst 
of purposes : the authority of the prince and 
of the laws was openly set at defiance ; the 
people were oppressed by exactions of every 
sort ; the state was torn in pieces by intestine 
commotions. 

But when the system of granting pecuniary 
supplies to the crown, in lieu of military servic- 
es, had become firmly established, a new state 
of things was quickly produced. The military 
force which these grants enabled the prince to 
raise, was employed, not in foreign wars only, 
but in taming the rebellious spirit of the nobles, 
and in augmenting the power of the crown. 
The nobles, destitute of union among them- 
selves, and overwhelmed by the inveterate hatred 
of the people, were compelled to surrender the 
power which they had so grossly abused ; and 
the people beheld with joy unfeigned, the es- 
tablishment of the regal authority, on the ruins 
of oligarchick tyranny. Justly regarding the 
dominion of one more tolerable than that of a 
thousand tyrants, they zealously co-operated 
with the prince in all his efforts. 

The monarchs of Europe, having once tasted 
the sweets of power, conferred on them by the 
possession of a military force exclusively their 
own, began to search out pretexts for giving 
permanency to this potent engine of state. 



u 



Charles the seventh, of France, favoured by 
circumstances, and urged on by a despotic tem- 
per, was the prince who led the way in this new 
and momentous experiment. During the reign 
of his predecessor, Charles the sixth, or rather 
during the reign of those bloody factions which 
the imbecility of that monarch had permitted to 
grow up in his kingdom, the English, under their 
gallant and accomplished monarch, Henry the 
jRfth, invaded the territory of France. Debili- 
tated by inveterate factions, the French monar- 
chy would have sunk under the furious assaults 
of its invaders, had not the death of the feeble 
Charles, and of his formidable opponent Henry, 
which occurred nearly at the same time, given a 
new and favourable turn to its affairs. The 
dauphin, now Charles the seventh, aroused by 
these propitious events from a despair which 
had well nigh proved fatal to the independence 
of his country, erected a standard around which 
loyalty might rally, and quickly sav/ himself at 
the head of all the " choice-drawn" cavaliers of 
his kingdom. A long and furious conflict with 
the English, gave him undisputed possession of 
the throne of his ancestors. Bred up in camps, 
and accustomed from his early youth until the 
prime of manhood, to the stern severity of mili- 
tary law, he carried the spirit of despotism from 
the field to the cabinet. Having seen and felt 



IS 

the evils which the tax administration of his 
father had produced, he resolved to hold with a 
stern and vigorous grasp the sceptre which his 
persevering valor had wrested from a foreign 
dynasty : he resolved, in short, to rule with 
despotic sway, both the nobility and the people. 
Full of this dark and gloomy project, he chose 
his measures with that promptness and decision, 
and executed them with that energy, which he 
had learnt amid the din of arms and in the 
school of adversity. The sword, it has been 
truly observed, is a machine of amazing power, 
but withal so simple in its mode of operation, 
that it may be employed successfully by the 
most rude and unskilful artist ; much more by 
the designing and sagacious Charles. The sit- 
uation of France at the close of the war, over- 
run with robbers and assassins, rendered the 
employment of a large military force by the go- 
vernment, for some time after the peace, a mea- 
sure of apparent necessity. The people were 
told, that a military force was essential to the 
protection of their lives and property against the 
attempts of lawless freebooters, and they fool- 
ishly swallowed the bait. Nine thousand vete- 
ran soldiers, the flower of his army, were retain- 
ed in the service by Charles, and their number, 
throughout the whole of his reign, was gradu- 
ally augmented. The effects of this inoinent- 



u 



i)us change were quickly seen, in the virtual 
abohtion of the states general, in the publication 
of arbitrary edicts, in a word, in the total pros- 
tration of all the powers of the state before the 
throne of the monarch. The example of Charles 
found an imitator in each of 'the princes of the 
continent. 

Thus were standing armies, in Europe, the 
offspring of the spirit of despotism, and, with true 
filial regard, they have cherished and supported 
the parent that produced them. 

The general introduction of standing armies 
con'^titutes an important era in the history of 
Europe. To this we may refer the rapid growth 
of arbitrary power in that quarter of the globe — 
the supernatural energy with which wars have, 
since that period, been waged — the enormous 
increase of taxation—and, finally, the adoption 
of the pernicious system of loans, which has ena- 
bled the governments of Europe to go to war 
with their whole capital— to waste the resources 
of the present, and encroach upon those of future 
generations. To this it is owing, that Europe 
has been converted into an immense entrenched 
camp, in which nothing is heard but the din of 
arms ; in which nothing is seen but blood, slaugh- 
ter, and confusion. 

Erom the year one thousand four hundred and 
forty-four, the era cf this momentous change 



1^ 

In the military system of France, until the pre- 
sent day, a standing army has been regularly 
kept up in that country : and from that period 
until the year one thousand seven hundred and 
ninety-two, its ranks were uniformly, even on 
the greatest emergencies, filled by voluntary en- 
listment. 

At the last mentioned period, the system of 
voluntary enlistment was exchanged for that of 
compulsory levy. In order fully to explain the 
motives of this change, and the means by which 
it was effected, it will be necessary to make some 
observations concerning that terrible revolution 
which was then feeding on the vitals of France, 
and v/hich turning its force outward, soon after 
deluged Europe with blood and desolated its 
fairest regions. 

For more than two hundred years before the 
French revolution, the people of France had lived 
contentedly under a government, which, though 
absolute in its form, was comparatively mild in 
its- administration. The evils of despotism were 
greatly alleviated in France by the loyalty of the 
people, by the affection which they felt for their 
monarchs, and by the reciprocal regard which 
the latter could not forbear entertaining for 
subjects who obeyed them with such zeal, such 
alacrity, such " proud humility," and who were 
so much devoted to their glory. But these, the 



happiest days of modern France, were soon to 
pass away. Towards the close of the eig-h- 
teenth century the demon of undiscriminating 
innovation, wearing the garb and appearance of 
the beneficient genius of reform, entered that 
devoted country, and gained the hearts of the 
people. The perfectibility of human nature, 
the absolute equality of men, the facility with 
which free governments might be established on 
the ruins of despotism, if the nations would but 
" will it." These were the splendid theories 
which were held up to their view ; these v/ere 
the " visions of glory" which glared on their 
aching sight. The nation was electrified ; every 
man was instantly converted into a legislator, 
and was miraculously gifted with the power, not 
only of demonstrating the absurdity of all esta- 
blished principles in government, in religion and 
in morality, but of prescribing fundamental laws 
to a mighty empire. The antique tree of des- 
potism, whose widely-extended and interwoven 
branches, while they protected them from the 
storm and the tempest, had chilled them with a 
withering shade, and intercepted the genial 
rays of the sun, was rooted up and delivered to 
the flames by the enthusiasm of the people of 
Trance : they fondly expected that a tree of li- 
berty would flourish in its place. Alas ! no: — 



17 

for the soil had been steeped in the blood, and 
watered with the tears of innocence. 

After divesting their king of his absolute 
power, and totally prostrating all the established 
institutions of the state, they fabricated a con- 
stitution so absurd, so weak, so inconsistent 
with itself and common sense, that discerning 
men instantly pronounced it to be, what it cer- 
tainly was, a mere temporary expedient, intend- 
ed by the jacobins who framed it to last only 
until their schemes for the total destruction of 
royalty should be more thoroughly matured. 

The jacobin society, self-created in one thou- 
sand seven hundred and eighty nine, for the ad- 
vancement of a revolution, by which its mem- 
bers hoped to attain dignity, wealth and power, 
encreased with the troubles of which it was the 
nefarious author. In the commencement of the 
year one thousand seven hundred and ninety 
two the jacobins were the predominant party in 
the state. The principal club, in Paris, presid- 
ed over and corresponded directly, with eleven 
hundred similarly organized societies in the de- 
partments ; and each of these had under its con- 
trol a circle of inferior clubs ; so that the whole 
number exceeded fifteen thousand. By means 
of these societies the influence of the jacobins 
was extended over the whole territory of France. 
They had, ere this, attained to such strength in 



J8 

the national assembly, as to the able, with the 
assistance of their armed adherents in the galli- 
ries, to enforce the adoption of any measure, 
however villainous and detestable ; and they 
now proceeded to the full exercise of their 
powers. 

It was they who raised the storm in which 
the bark of royally foundered, and the prospe- 
rity of the nation was wrecked ; who converted 
the spirit of innovation into a thirst for blood 
•and a furious love of anarchy ; who worked up 
the revolutionary tempest, and then " rode in 
the whirlwind," and directed the fury of the 
storm ; pointed its bolts against the breast of 
innocence, and consumed, with its lightning, as 
w.il the cottage of the peasant as the palace of 
the noble. 

Under the domination of this infernal faction, 
the members of which were perpetually de- 
claiming about the rights of man, while they 
habitually trampled the most sacred of them 
under foot — unhappy France, drenched with 
the Jolood of her children, sviffered calamities 
which language is too poor to describe. The 
history of those times will be considered by pos- 
terity as a libel on human nature : its credulity 
will be staggered by the relation of enormities, 
which, if they had not been perpetrated could 
not have been conceived- possible. In those 



n 



days of tremendous anarchy and bloody misrule^ 
in that furious conflict of all the diabolical pas- 
sions, the ties of kindred, of affinity, of friend- 
ship and of social love were broken. Robbery, 
rape and murder are words which convey no ade- 
quate idea of the crimes which indelibly stained 
the annals of revolutionary France.* 

But I have not imposed upon myself the hate- 
ful task of detailing the attrocities of the jaco- 
bins, and I regret having touched on a subject 
so full of dreadful import. 

Some months before the insurrection of the 
tenth of August, one thousand seven hundred 
and ninety two, which gave the coup de grace to 
the Bourbon dynasty in France, the jacobins 
had involved their country in a war with Austria. 
The pretext for the declaration of war, which 
was made in April, '92, was the alleged treaty 
of Pilnitz, and the permission given to the emi- 
grants, assembled at Coblentz, to form them- 
selves into a military corps. This treaty of 
Pilnitz is stated, by those v/ho believe in its ex- 
istence, to have been an agreement between the 
emperor Leopold, and the kings of Prussia and 



* " Cruelties for which there did not exist a name in any 
language, until their perpetrators invented, by way of ironi- 
cal pleasantry, names A^hich will eternize their infamy and 
astonish posterity ; such as Noyades, Baignades, Deporta^ 
tion, Vertical deportation, Republican marriage, &c." 

Playfair^s '* Hist, of Jacobinism^'' vol. \, p. 25, in press 



^0 



Sardinia " to maintain the liberty of Louis the 
sixteenth, and the independence of other king- 
doms."* But it requires no extraordinary de- 
gree of sagacity to discern other and more ade- 
quate motives for the conduct of the jacobins, in 
declaring war against Austria. Having possess- 
ed themselves of the sovereign authority in 
France, they sought, by involving their country 
in war, to augment their power, and render it 
permanent. While they remained at peace with 
foreign states they dreaded an insurrection of 
the people against their tyrannical sway. A 
war, by placing at their disposal an immense 
military force, would enable them to crush every 
insurrection, and would render them entirely 
independent of the popular will. The event 
demonstrated the correctness of their calcula- 
tions ; for when several of the departments, in 
the year one thousand seven hundred and nine- 
ty three, driven to desperation by the tyranny 
of the jacobin government, took up arms a- 
gainst it, they were overwhelmed by an immense 
military force ; their towns and villages were 
razed to the ground, and half the population of 
the country exterminated. Never, before, had 
rebellion been so cruelly chastised. 

But the preservation of these powers by 
means of a military force, was not the only mo- 

* Playfair's "History of Jacobinism," vol. 1, p. 34r. 



21 

tive of the jacobins for declaring war against 
Austria : — they were Frenchmen — and they 
inherited from their fathers an insatiable thirst 
for conquest. They were possessed of means 
incomparatively greater than those with which 
Louis the fourteenth had attempted the subju- 
gation of Europe, and they were vain enough 
to believe that they could apply them with far 
greater ability. No government indeed, ancient 
or modern, ever possessed means, moral and 
physical, equal to those which were now at their 
disposal. The blind enthusiasm of a great por- 
tion of the people and the revolutionary energy 
of the government were, of themselves, suffi- 
cient to render France more formidable to her 
neighbours than she had been in any age be- 
fore : — but these were not the only advantages 
she possessed over the other European states. 

Her pecuniary means were almost unlimited. 
The national assembly, in the year one thou- 
sand seven hundred and ninety, perceiving that 
the great objects of their elections, the replen- 
ishment of the treasury, and the restoration of 
order to the finances^ were farther than ever 
from being obtained, resorted to an expedient 
which the unjust and tyrannical government 
whose abuses they were pretending to correct, 
would not have dared even to suggest. They 
enacted a law declaring all the landed estates of 



22 

the clergy, to J>e national property.* On the 
credit of the landed capital thus honorably ac- 
quired, they issued government bills (assignats) 
to an almost incredible amount, f The circu- 
lation of this new species of money was enforc- 
ed by every sanction which the government 

* They pretended to give to the clergy a pecuniary cora- 
pensation for their services, in lieu of the lands of which 
they deprived them. But this was merely a cloak for their 
iniquity. The enjoyment of the stipend allowed by the gov- 
ernment was clogged with conditions to which no conscien- 
tious Roman Catholic priest could assent. Nine tenths of 
them accordingly refused to comply ; these were denominat- 
ed non-jurors, and after being persecuted in the most cruel 
manner, were at length banished. 

f Ramel, in his " History of the finances of the republic," 
states the amount of the assignats which were issued to be 
forty thousand millions of francs, equivalent to two thousand 
millions sterling, or nearly nine thousand millions of dollars ! 
When the directoral government, in 1 795, declared itself un- 
able to redeem them and refused to make any sort of com- 
promise with the holders, the assignats bore the current va- 
lue of one six hundred and sixty-sixth part of their nominal 
amount ! and yet the depreciation was not so rapid as might 
have been expected ; for Arthur Young, esq. in his " Tour 
through France," vol. 1. pa. 520, says, *' In September 1790, 
four hundred millions of assignats were in circulation ; but 
the discount at Bordeaux never exceeded ten^ at Paris six per 
cent. And in May 1791, after many hundred millions more 
were issued, the discount was from seven to ten per cent." 
If any further evidence be wanted of the amazing extent, 
at the commencement of the revolution, of the pecuniary 
resources of France, it may be found in the fact that ** the 
republic maintained fourteen different armies. The troops 
paid were estimated at 1,400,000. The fronts of the troops 
defending her on the east, occupied a line of 500 leagues, 
&c. Forty sous were paid, for sometime, to the individuals 
who frequented the popular societies. The theatres of Paris 
were hired to give gratuitous exhibitions." — Ramel. 



23 

could devise. It was the representative, not of 
specie, (as are bank bills in the United States) 
but of land; and as the sales of the estates of 
thectergy commenced about the same time that 
the assignats were issued, they were, at that 
time, convertible into the commodity which they 
represented. This conferred upon them some 
real value, and the irresistible mandate of a 
revolutionary government gave them at first the 
currency of specie. 

But this was not the only extraordinary re- 
source of the revolutionay government. The 
sale of the confiscated property of the emigrants, 
real and personal, produced in the course of 
the revolution, nearly five hundred millions of 
dollars. In December, one thousand seven hun- 
dred and ninety-four, Mr. Pitt asserted on the 
floor of the house of commons, that three hun- 
dred and twenty millions sterling, was the price 
which France had paid within two years, for the 
conquests she had made.* If such were her 
expenditures, how great must have been her re- 
sources. 

But whether the revolutionary government 
was encouraged by the possession of means so 
extensive, or prompted by ambition, or whatever 
may have been its motives for commencing the 

* " Life of William Pitt," Anon. pa. 97. 



24, 
••• 

war which has ever smce been waged against 
the Uberties of Europe, it is certain, that it de- 
rived from the existence of that war a pretext for 
adopting the system of compulsive miHtary levy. 

It was in the month of July, one thousand 
seven hundred and ninety two, that the national 
assembly laid the foundation of the present mi- 
litary system of France, by declaring the coun- 
try in danger, and ordering the levy en masse to 
be made. But though the principle of compul- 
sory levy was then adopted, and has ever since 
been acted upon, under different modifications, 
no regular permanent system was formed until 
the year one thousand seven hundred and ninety 
eight, when the law of the conscription was 
enacted by the directorial government. 

" The directorial plan," says the Edinburgh 
Review " is attributed to Carnot, who, in the re- 
volutionary language, is said ' to have organized 
victory in the French armies." Its author, who 
was enthusiastically devoted to the forms of an- 
tiquity, and still preserves, within the rays of the 
imperial purple, all the simplicity of ancient 
manners, found his model in the conscription of 
the Roman republic, which made every citizen 
a soldier, before the age of forty six, in the an- 
nual levies, which admitted of no exception, and 
in the peremptory orders issued by their con- 
suls to the magistrates of Italy, specifying the 



25 

number of troops required, and the place of 
their assemblage."* 

The writer of these pages at first intended to 
trace the existing military system of France 
from its source, through all its doublings and 
meanders, through all its various changes and 
modifications, until it attained its present state 
of horrible perfection. Such an investigation 
would have exhibited an instructive view of the 
wanton caprices, of the depraved ingenuity, of 
the uniform disregard, as well, of the most sa- 
cred rights of men, as of the cries of suffering 
humanity, which amid all the storms of the re- 
volution, from the downfall of the Bourbons to 
the present era, have been displayed by each of 
the successive governments of France. But 
discovering that materials for so extensive an in- 
vestigation were not within his reach, he was 
obliged to contract his plan, and content him- 
self with displ'djing the system of conscription as 
it is. And here he is happy to avail himself of 
the aid of an abler pen than his own. Possess- 
ing no other knowledge of the system of con- 
scription than that which he derives from a very 
able analysis of a workf published in Paris, 

* The reader is referred to the appendix for a more de- 
tailed account of the military system of ancient Rome, than 
that here given. 

t Code de la Conscription, ou Recueil Chronologique des 
lois et des arretes du gouvernement, des decrets imperiaux 
5 



26 

in one thousand eight hundred and six, with 
which the Edinburgh Reviewers have favoured 
the Hterary world, he deems it more becoming a 
mere tyro in letters, to exhibit their detail in 
their own clear and forcible language, than to 
invest their ideas in his own inferior style. He 
reserves for himself the task of making such ob- 
servations, comments and practical deductions 
as fall within the scope of his plan. The abi- 
lity with which the few following pages are writ- 
ten will evince the correctness of the decision 
which he has made. 

"That our readers may the better understand 
our abstract of the laws on the conscription, it 
is proper to premise, that France is divided into 
about thirty military governments, subject to a 
general of division and his staff, to which com- 
missaries are attached, as executive officers. 
The civil division consists of one hundred and 
twenty two departments ; twenty four of which 
have been acquired since the overthrow of the 
monarchy, exclusive of Tuscany, not included 
in any part of this statement. The departments 
are divided into districts or arrondissemcntSy from 
three to five in number ; the arrondissemenis 
into cantons, and the cantons into municipalities, 



relatives k la Icvec des couscrits, a leur remplacement^ aux 
dispenses dc service, Sec. denuis Tan 6, iusques et comnvis 
-I'an 14." 



27 

amounting to about fifty five thousand. Each 
department is governed by a prefect and his 
council, composed of a commissary of poUce, 
a mayor and certain inspectors, denominated 
counsellors of prefecture. The district or 
arrondissement^ by a subprefect and his council, 
of a similar foundation. The cantons and mu- 
nicipalities are under the supervision of an ad- 
ministration, composed of the civil authorities, 
with a president at their head. A mayor, a com- 
missary of police and two officers of the govern- 
ment, styled adjuncts, are allotted to every di- 
vision, having a population above five thousand 
souls. These several authorities are in strict 
subordination to each other, and at the controul 
of the prefects and subprefects ; who themselves 
are charged with a weighty and inflexible res- 
ponsibility, as to the military levies." 

" The conscription was first published in the 
form of a general law, by the council of ancients, 
in the year 1798, and has since undergone some 
slight modifications." 

by the lav*^ of the directory, ail Frenchmen 
are pronounced soldiers ; and when the country 
is declared in danger^ are liable to be summoned 
to its defence. In any other conjuncture " the 
wants of the army are relieved by the conscrip- 
tion,'^ and the requisite number of conscripts is 
determined by the senate or legislative body, at 



28 

the suggestion of the executive government. 
The law which Hmits the whole number, regu- 
lates, at the same time, the contingent of each 
department, proportionally to its population. 
Within eight days after publication, the prefect 
distributes this contingent among the districts, 
by the same rule ; and the subprefect among the 
cantons and municipalities. All Frenchmen 
hetiveen the full age of twenty and ttventy Jive 
complete, are liable to the conscription. They 
are each year thrown into five classes ; the first 
of which consists of those who have completed 
tiieir twentieth year on the 1st. vendemaire, or 
16th. of September preceding \ the second of 
those who, at the same period, have terminated 
their twenty first year, and so on, in the order of 
seniority. Thus, the conscript, who has attain- 
ed the full age of tw^enty five, remains liable, 
until the month and day just mentioned. The 
municipal administrations are bound to prepare 
lists, framed from the registers of births, and 
from common notoriety, which particularize the 
name, domicile, stature, &ic. of ail the individu- 
als subject to the conscription, within their juris- 
diction. The same individuals are also bound 
to enrol themselves, with a similar specifications 
at the office of the municipality, as soon as the 
law is published. Both lists are then transmit- 
ted to the prefects, who are responsible for their 



29 

accuracy, and who immediately consign them 
over to the " minister of war." 

Eight days are allotted to the preparation o£ 
the li&ts. The conscripts are then assembled 
in 6ach canton, and examined by the adrainistra- 
tioh^^r by a special commission, created ad hoc 
by the prefect. The merits of all pleas of ex- 
emption are scrutinized at these meetings. Such 
as plead infirm aties, if able to attend, are ex- 
a:mined on the spot ; and if not, are visited at 
their dwellings, by "the inspectors and health 
officers." The latter^ generally physicians in 
the army, are not selected until the moment of 
the examination ; and, to obviate collusion, must 
belong to a district, different from that of the 
conscript. The final decision of all cases of 
exemption is referred to a commission of higher 
resort, composed of the prefect, the general of- 
ficers and commissaries of the department. 
When the claims are disposed of, lists are form- 
ed of those who are judged competent to serve, 
whether present or absent ; and the subprefect 
then proceeds to the drawing or designation, by 
lot, of such as are to constitute the quota of the 
district. Tickets, regularly numbered, to the 
amount of the names on the list, are publickly 
deposited in an urn, and indiscriminately drawn 
out by the conscripts or their friends* The lot 
falls upon those who draw the numbers below 



30 

the amount of the quota. The higher numbers, 
drawn by the rest, are annexed to their names, 
in order that they may be forthcoming in their 
orders, should any casualty disable their prede- 
cessors. Absentees, not presenting themselves 
within a month after the drawing, are declared 
refractory, proclaimed throughout the empire, 
and pursued as deserters." 

" These are the conscripts of " the actual 
serviced But, besides these, the law requires 
an equal number^ to form what is termed, in con- 
tradistinction, the conscription of " the reserve.''^ 
The members of the reserve are nominated 
with the same formalities, to mordi only in cases 
of emergency ; are regularly organized, and 
carefully disciplined, within their own depart- 
ments, from which, they are not suffered to ab- 
sent themselves. A third body is then created, 
of supj)lcmental conscripts^ equal in number to 
one fourth of the whole contingent, and destined 
to fill up the vacancies which may be occasion- 
ed, before junction at head-quarters, by death, 
desertion or other causes. If the supplement 
should not be adequate to this purpose, the re- 
serve supplies its place ; and, at all events, no 
deficiency is permitted, as each canton is ac- 
countable for its full assessment. No French- 
man, under the age of thirty, can travel through 
the empire, or hold any situation under govern- 



31 



ment, or serve in any public ofnce, unless he- 
can produce a certificate, duly authenticated, at- 
testing that he has discharged his liability to the 
conscription. 

" All authorities are bound solidum and under 
the severest sanctions, to observe that the con- 
scripts are assembled, reviewed, and dismissed 
to their destination without delay. They are 
marched under an escort of gendarmerie, and in 
bodies strictly liinited to the number of one hmi" 
dredj to various quarters or depots, throughout 
the empire, and there first supplied with arms 
and clothing. They are never permitted to ex- 
ist in separate ba,ttalions, but are individually 
(nominativement) draughted into, or scattered 
through distinct corps of the pre-existing army, 
to which they are marched, in exceedingly 
small detachments, and sometimes from an as- 
tonishing distance." 

Dispensations are given by the higher military 
tribunal of the prefect ; and are provisional or 
definite, according to the nature of the disability 
pleaded. For all diseases pronounced curable, 
the discharge is but temporary. The infirmi- 
ties which tend to disqualify, are discriminated 
with the nicest care, and accompanied by co- 
pious scientific explanations. The minister 
of war reviews the decisions of this tribunal ; 
and if a suspicion of partiality arise, orders 



Qi 



2 



the medical inquiry to be renewed. The 
party released pays an indemnity to the go- 
vernment, the amount of which is proportion- 
ed, by the perfect, to his taxes, or those of his 
parents. No exceptions were originally allowed 
to the law " of active service ;" but at this mo- 
ment, the eldest brother of an orphan family, the 
only son of a widow, or of a labourer above the 
age of seventy, or one who has a brother in the 
active service, may on soliciting the indulgence, 
be transferred to the reserve. The same pri- 
vilege is accorded to those, who have taken the 
order of sub-deacon in the eclesiastical semina- 
ries. Parents continue responsible for their 
absent children, iintil they can produce an ojficial 
attestation of their death. 

" The directory admitted of no substitution ; 
but the serverity of this principle is now relaxed 
in favour of such as are adjudged " incapable of 
sustaining the fatigues of war,^'' or, '' whose la- 
bours and studies are deemed more useful to the 
state than their military services."* 

Proxies are therefore received only ad libi- 
tum, not as a matter of right ; and never without 
a special mandate from the minister of war. 

* In the year 1798 the hiw was repealed which exempted 
married persons from the conscription. Depera, and with 
him Mahhiis, attributed the increased proportion of births 
anterior to that period, to premature marriages, to avoid the 
military levies. — Malthus B. 2, C\ 6. 



Si 

The conscript furnishes a sum of about £5, 
(100 francs) for the equipment of his substitute, 
who must be between the ages of tive?ityjiveand 
forty ^ of the middle size at least, of a robust con- 
stitution, of a good character ; certified by his 
municipality, and himself beyond the reach of the 
conscription laws. He bears the surname of his 
principal, in order that the latter may be known 
and compelled to march, should his proxy desert, 
or be lost from any other cause than death, or 
wounds received in battle, ivithin the term of 
two years.^' 

"All the enacting clauses of this system, are 
fortified by heavy denunciations against public 
functionaries, parents or others, who contribute 
to defeat or retard its operation. Any health 
officer or other functionary, convicted of fur- 
nishing a false cerdficate of infirmity, &c. is 
subjected to five years imprisonment in irons. 
All civil and military officers, even of the high- 
est rank, convicted of favouring the escape, or 
concealing the retreat of a fugitive, are exposed 
to excessive fines. Conscripts detected in coun- 
terfeiting infirmities, or mutilating themselves, 
are placed " at the disposition of the government" 
for five years, to be employed in such public 
labours as may be judged most useful to the state. 
The absentees or refractory conscripts, whose 
apprehension is secured by the most minute and 



o 



^ 



efficient ])recautions, besides undergoing the 
corporal punishment entailed on their (tffence, 
are amerced in a sum of eighteen hundred francs, 
equivalent, from the comparative value of money 
in the two countries, to about one hundred and 
twenty pounds sterling. This sum, together 
with the expenses incurred in the pursuit, is 
levied on the real property of the father or 
mother, should the fugitive possess none in his 
own right. 

" Nine garrison tov/ns are designated, through- 
out the empire, as depots for the refractory con- 
scripts. They are lodged in the citadel, sub- 
jected to a most rigid discipline, and made to 
work in the arsenal, or on the roads, clad in a 
particular uniform, with their heads closely 
shaved. Five years constitute the term allotted 
to this confinement ; but it is ^added '' that they 
are gradually to be drafted into the army" as 
they give tokens of docility and reformation. 
" Every conscript absenting himself twenty four 
hours from his depot, is punished as a deserter. 
A special council of war is assembled to decide 
upon cases of desertion. The penal sanctions 
are, first, death ; second, the punishment of 
the ball (lapaine du boulet) ; and third, public 
or hard labour." 

" The nature of the second, the punishment of 
the ball, merits notice. Anii:on ball, of eight 



S5 

pounds weight, and fastened to an iron chain 
seven feet in length, is attached to the leg of the 
deserter. He, in the first instance, hears his sen- 
tence read, on his knees, and is condemned to 
hard labour, during ten hours daily, and in the 
intervals of rest, to be chained in solitary con- 
finement. This sentence is rigorously executed, 
and embittered by all the external marks of ig- 
nominy, in dress and appearance. The dura- 
tion of this punishment, which is ten years, is 
prolonged, and an additional ball fettered to the 
leg, in cases of contumacy, or serious disobe- 
dience. We have remarked a curious provision 
connected with this double delinquency. The 
party is solemnly interdicted, under pain of two 
years imprisonment in irons, from fixing him- 
self, after he is set at liberty, within twenty 
leagues of the seat of government I 

" The third class of punishment (les travaux 
pvtblics) is exempted from the iron ball ; and, in 
other respects, only differs from the preceding, 
ii\ the length of the term, which is but three 
years. A fine of 1,500 francs is inseparable 
from all cases of desertion. Death is inflicted 
on the deserter to the enemy, and on him, who, 
in deserting from the punishment of the ball, 
carries off his own arms or those of his comrades. 
The punishment of the ball is adjudged to such, 
as escape into the interior of the empire with 



36 

their uniform, or with the eft'ects of another ; 
or from the public labours which are inflicted 
upon those who are guilty of simple desertion 
into the interior. In time of war, every officer 
or soldier absenting himself forty-eight hours 
without permission, is reputed a deserter. The 
laws on the subject of desertion are read to the 
whole French army on the first Sunday of eve- 
ry month." 

Such is the law of the conscription, as detail- 
ed in the Edinburgh review. The author then 
proceeds to speak of the abuses which render 
this law, terrible as it is in theory, still more 
monstrous in its practical operation. 

" Our readers may have observed in the de- 
rails of this system, a semblance of tenderness 
towards those persons, whose situation is apt to 
rouse those indignant feelings — that insurgent 
consciousness of right which undisguised op- 
pression neverfailsto excite even among the most 
degraded of human beings. Hypocrisy is the 
defence of fear against just resentment, and 
may therefore be well entitled, not only the hom- 
age which vice offers to virtue, but the tribute 
which despotism pays to liberty. The provi- 
sions on the subject of the reserve, to which 
we particularly allude, are altogether illusory. 
The ostensible purpose of its creation is to 
supply possible deficiencies, and to assist the ar- 



S7 

mies in cases of great emergency. The emer- 
gency however, has always been found to exist. 
" Tyrannorum enim preces, nosti, quam, permix- 
tce, necessitatibus,^^ and the reserve is uniformly 
compelled to march. Not only are all the con- 
scripts of the current year thus swept away ; 
but those of the preceding years, who have ob- 
tained a charter of exemption, under the condi- 
tions prescribed by law, are all dragged into the 
field by a decree of the military chief of their 
departments. We must not forget to mention 
another flagrant breach of law, if any enormity 
can be so called, which is committed, not only 
with impunity, but under the sanction of public 
authority. In the first tumults of the revolu- 
tion, the parochial registers, at no period very 
accurately kept, were almost wholly neglected. 
As, therefore, no official documents can be pro- 
duced for youths between seventeen and twenty, 
the recruiting officers, within the two last years,* 
hav© taken advantage of this circumstance to 
include in the conscription numbers whose ap- 
pearance corroborated their assertion, that they 
were beyond the age, and whose remonstranc- 
es were rendered unavailing by their condition 
in life. The most formidable, however, of all 
the evils extraneous to the code we have ana- 

* Before 1808. 



38 

lyzed, is a practice which has prevailed for some 
years, of anticipating, bylaw, the regular levies. 
The conscripts, as we know, of 1810, are al- 
ready " (1808)" called out ; and by this it 
must be understood, that those who would then 
attain the age of twenty, are already made to 
serve in the armies. These, and other causes, 
connected with the abuse of unlimited power, 
bring into the field a numerous population of 
boys, in appearance scarce able to bear the ac- 
coutrements of a soldier, and who, in their pre- 
paratory exercises, are objects both of pity and 
amazement." 

Such is the theory, and such the practical 
operation of the military system of France. — It 
has before been stated* that the French revo- 
lutionists, enthusiastic admirers and imitators of 
every thing Roman, formed, or rather professed 
to form their system of compulsory levy on the 
m«;del of the Roman system of conscription. 
The reader was before referred to a sketch of 
that system, which, to avoid too great a digres- 
sion from the subject immediately under discus- 
sion, has been placed in the appendix. A com- 
parison will now be instituted between the lead- 
ing regulations of the ancient and modern sys- 
tems. Svich a comparison will shew what im- 

* Page 24 ante* 



pfovements " the age of reason" has made on 
the institutions of antiquity, and niay shed ad- 
ditional Hght on the native, intrinsic, peculiar 
deformity — on the broad and striking features 
of depravity which the modern system has been 
shewn to possess. — But it is evident, that a 
comparison between the French and Roman 
systems cannot be fairly made, without a refer- 
ence to the situation and circumstances of Rome 
and France, and to the character and habits of 
the two nations, at the periods when they were 
respectively adopted. An oppressive military 
system is, in itself, bad ; but our censure of it 
sliould be encreased or diminished by a view of 
the situation, circumstances and character of 
the people on whom it is imposed. 

With respect to the Romans, then, it, may be 
alleged with truth, that they were propelled by 
necessity to the adoption of the system of com- 
pulsory levy : — such a system was, at that time, 
essential to their defence against the warlike 
tribes which pressed their little commonwealth 
on every side, and threatened it with premature 
extinction. — The French, on the contrary, 
adopted the system without necessity, at a time 
when they could have raised, by voluntary 
enlistment, an army sufficiently numerous, not 
only to defend France, but to make every other 
state on the continent tremble for its safetv. — ■ 



40 



That they adopted it without necessity, is an in- 
ference fairly deducible from facts notorious to 
all the world. 

When Francis the first, in the sixteenth cen- 
tury, contended for mastery with Charles the 
fifth, whose dominions, exclusive of America, 
were more than twice as extensive and populous 
as his, he found no difficulty in defending his 
frontier, and even extended his views to foreign 
conquest, without the aid of a compulsory levy. 
When the loss of an army in Italy had laid his 
frontiers open to invasion, when his territory 
was in fact invaded, by a numerous army, under 
the command of Charles himself, he even then 
compelled his enemies to make a precipitate 
and disgraceful retreat, without resorting to this 
odious expedient. Moreover, it is known to all 
the v/orld, that Louis the fourteenth, in his ex- 
treme old age, when his finances had been ruin- 
ed by a long course of profusion, and the pop- 
ulation of his kingdom greatly diminished by 
war and famine, not only defended France 
against the attacks of " the grand alliance," di- 
rected by two of the ablest generals in Europe,* 
but kept up a numerous army in Spain, without 
dragging a single unwilling peasant from his 
home. If the simple statement of these facts 

* Prince Eugene and the Duke of Marlborough. 



41 

be insufficient to shew that the adoption of the 
system of compulsive levy in one thousand 
seven hundred and ninety two was unnecessary, 
a single glance at the situation of France and 
her neighbours, at that period, will operate com- 
plete conviction. What mighty danger had 
France to apprehend from the attacks of Aus- 
tria and Prussia, ivith whom alone she was then 
at war — a war, be it remembered too, com- 
menced by herself? — Did not her rulers know 
full well the inveterate hereditary hatred which 
the houses of Lorraine and Brandenburg cher- 
ished against each other ? — Did they not know 
that an union between the blood of Frederic the 
second and that of Maria Theresa, could not 
in the nature of things be permanent ! — Or, if 
these well-founded calculations had proved in- 
correct, what had she to fear from their united 
force ? — It had always been inferior to that of 
France, and at this time it was more so than 
ever. In the revolutionary energy and enthu- 
siasm alone of the French people, the govern- 
ment possessed a resource which would have 
enabled it to resist the v/orld united, without 
forcing a single man into the ranks. In truth, 
until the excessive tyranny of the revolution- 
ary government had alienated the hearts ol the 
people, the compulsive levy had a nominal ex- 
istence only. The enthusiasm of a gallant peo^ 



4.2 

pie would not suffer it to be enforced : They 
flocked around the standard on which the tal- 
ismanic words liberty and equality were inscrib- 
ed. If, in addition to this, we consider the im- 
mense extent of those pecuniary resources which 
the French government possessed* we shall be 
convinced that it could have raised, without re- 
sorting to the system of conscription, a military 
force more than sufficient for any legitimate pur- 
pose. — Such being the fact, how terrible a re- 
sponsibility have they incurred who introduced 
the system into France ! — What a mass of hu- 
man misery have they unnecessarily produced — 
how many accusing sighs and groans have been 
registered in " heaven's chancery" against them 
— how many curses are daily and hourly im- 
precated on their heads, by the women and 
children whose husbands and fathers have been 
torn from their fond embraces by the operation 
of this detestable system ! 

But let us proceed with our inquiry into the 
relative situations of Rome and France when 
each adopted its military system. — The Romans 
were, from the building of their city until long 
after the introduction of the compulsive levy, a 
community of soldiers ;t — their military system 

* See page 21, ante. 

f This is literally the fact : agi-icultUre (in a great degree) 
the mechanical arts, the instruction of youth, and even the 
medical prote$sion, were the business of slaves. 



4S 



grew out of their manners and habits, and was, 
consequently, in a great degree, adapted to both. 
The French, on the contrary, when the system 
of conscription was suddenly forced upon them 
by their revolutionary government, were in 
proportion of twenty four to one* employed in 
agricultural, -commercial and other civil pur- 
suits : — when the enthusiasm of the revolution 
had somewhat abated, they perceived that the 
system was completely at war with all their 
" habitudes and feelings" — -with their customs- 
and their prejudices. 

Most truly is it said, in the criticism from 
which such copious extracts have been made, 
that these " should be consulted m every gen- 
eral act of legislation." In every civilized coun- 
try there is a large number of young men, de- 
voted to books, anxious to acquire a stock of 
learning which may enable them to attain lite- 
rary distinction, and confer benefits on the com- 
munity, and capable of filling civil offices with 
ability — but averse, from principle, to a partici- 
pation in wars of injustice and aggression. There 
are, doubtless, many such in France. How 



* The military establishment of France, before the revo- 
lution was two hundred thousand only, out of a military 
population of five millions. It is now nearly a million. 
The above stated proportion of twenty four to one, has 
reference to the men able to bear arms. 



u 

keenly must such men feel the injustice and op- 
pression of the system of compulsive and indis- 
criminate levy ! — How much they curse the 
tyrannical government whose mandate drags 
them from their academic shades, blasts all their 
prospects of literary or professional eminence — 
forces them into the ranks, and carries them 
into distant climes, to fight the battles of ambi- 
tion : 

" To the great body of professional men, and 
of drooping merchants and manufacturers, who 
educate their children with care and tenderness, 
and who find no compensation in the splendour 
of the imperial diadem, for the degradation of 
their own order, and the loss of domestic com- 
forts, the conscription appears the maximum of 
human sufferings, the most odious of all wrongs, 
and the most vexatious of all injustice. The 
lysees, or public schools, the seminaries of ec- 
clesiastical noviciate, the universities of law and 
physic, are all subject to the visits of the re- 
cruiting officer, and forced to surrender up their 
pupils, without exception of genius or taste, at 
a period of life when the morals are in a state 
of oscillation — when the character of the frame 
itself is scarcely determined, and the understand- 
ing but in the first stage of development. Pa- 
rents are not only made to suffer the pains of 
a separation under such circumstances but are 



45 

condemned to the unexpressible grief of seeing 
the principles and m?inners of their children ex- 
posed to total wreck, in the infectious commu- 
nion of common soldiery — the meanest and most 
profligate of mankind. The impressment of a 
British seamen is doubtless a revolting specta- 
cle ; but falls far short of the scene of real dis- 
tress, exhibited at the balloting of a conscription, 
when the parents or friends of the conscript are 
. indulged, as is often the case, in drawing the tick- 
et from the fatal urn. The piercing shrieks and 
tumultuous acclamations alternately uttered on 
these occasions by a people to whom nature has 
allotted such vivacity of character, wholly over- 
power the feeling of a spectator, and conduct 
him irresistibly to the conclusions we have adopt- 
ed concerning the spirit v»rith which the imperial 
dispensations are obeyed." 

Thus heavily does the conscription fall on the 
middle class, who are not oppressed by actual 
want, and who depend not on the labour of their 
hands for subsistence. But to the wretched 
peasantry of France it is productive of the ut- 
most extremity of misery. To live under a mi- 
litary despotism, to bear a burthen of taxation 
such as no nation ever before endured, to see 
the surplus produce of their country rendered 
valueless by a perpetual embargo ; all this is 
bad enough, but the compulsive levy caps the 



4& 

climax of their sufferings. How many thou- 
sands of famiUes must there be among the pea- 
santry of that extensive and populous country, 
in- which the father alone is able to perform effi- 
cient labour, and which therefore depend chiefly 
on the wages of his labour for subsistence. 
The mandate which tears the husband and the 
father from such a family, must sound in their 
ears more terrible than a sentence of death. 
Ah ! would the tyrant but enter the lowly habi- 
tation of the peasant, while the ready ministers 
of his injustice and cruelty are enforcing his 
decrees, would he but witness the parting of. a 
husband and a father from his children and his 
wife, under such deplorable circumstances, his 
obdurate heart might be melted ! — How could 
he gaze on the mute anguish of the victim — on 
his eye, now rolling with rage and frenzy, and 
anon fixed and settled into the resignation of 
despair ; how could he listen to the heart-rend- 
ing shrieks of the wife, without cursing and ab- 
juring a system fraught with such a multitude of 
evils ? But, no : — his flinty heart never knew one 
.soft emotion, one sensation of pity, or he would 
long since, have healed the wounds of bleeding 
Europe, and released his subjects from the griev- 
ous shackles of the conscription. To gratify 
his inordinate thirst, his insatiable longing for 
power, the arts and the sciences, the refinements 



47 

of civilized life, the happiness of his subjects, 
the repose of the world, all, all must be sacri- 
ficed. 

It will appear from the comparison which will 
now be instituted between the French and 
Roman systems, that unjust and oppressive as 
the latter undoubtedly was, it was just and le- 
nient compared with the former. It will appear 
that this monster, the offspring of the boundless 
ambition and cruel ingenuity of the French go- 
vernment, possesses not one of th€ fair features 
of its ancient kinsman, while it exhibits all hi§ 
deformities, heightened and rendered still more 
disgusting, and some that are new and peculiar 
to itself. The oppressive regulations of the Ro- 
man system are rendered still more so, new re-^ 
gulations of the same sort are added, all its pro- 
visions of lenity are omitted. 

1. In the Roman systems, for example, the 
time of service was limited: — in the French it 
is unlimited. After serving twenty years in 
the foot, or ten in the horse, the Roman was 
exempted from further liability to the conscrip- 
tipn. The Frenchman, when he enters into the 
service of the emperor, is a slave for life. The 
Roman soldier beheld a term to his military la- 
bours, beyond which "hopes creative spirit" could 
erect " a trophy sacred to his future days." In 
contemplating, v/ith fond anticipation, the ease 



48 

and tranquility of his old age,* he forgot the toils 
and the privations of the passing hour The 
Frenchman is cut off entirely from these delu- 
sive but soul-soothing anticipations. 

2. The Romans, of course, punished the re- 
fractory conscript and the deserter : the French 
inflict punishment not on them only, but — proh 
pudor ! on their innocent p arents ! In all the 
annals of tyranny nothing can be found more 
detestable than this. The statutes of Draco 
were said, because of their excessive rigour, to 
have been written in blood ; but he, sanguinary 
as he was — or Nero, or Caligula, never dared 
so far to outrage human feelings, as to enact a 
law inflicting punishment on parents for the crimes 
of their children. A stranger to the character of 
the French military code, and of the French 
government, would suppose that this excessive 
rigour, this novelty, this anomaly in legislation, 
was reserved for offences of the deepest die. 
How great would be his astonishment, and, if 
he possessed one particle of virtuous feeling, 
how glowing would be his indignation, when he 
learnt that it was aimed at a venial trespass, at 
an offence not malum in se, but only malum pro- 
hibitum — that its object was to prevent human 

* The disbanded Roman soldiers, in the latter age of the 
republic, Tor the most part, received a donation oflandiVom 
the government. 



49 

beings from attempting to escape perpetual sla- 
very. 

3 The Romans exempted from liability to 
the conscription those who laboured under phy- 
sical disabilities : — the French, of necessity, do 
so likewise ; but they exact from the unfortu- 
nate victim of disease or casualty a pecuniary 
indemnity ! 

In America, in England, in every civilized 
country hut France, the diseased and the maim- 
ed meet with the commiseration of their fellow 
men ; and, if they stand in need of it, the elee- 
mosynary aid of the local authorities. In 
France alone is it penal to be unfortunate-— in 
France alone is a tax levied on corporeal disabi- 
lity — in France alone does the government ag- 
gravate the misery of those afflicted with incu^ 
rable disorders, by demanding of them a pecu« 
niary indemnity ! 

. 4. The sanctions of the Roman system, though 
in a great degree arbitrary, w^ere in practice com« 
paratively mild : those of the French are se- 
vere and inhuman. That those of the Romans 
were in practice mild, is proved by the testimony 
of all the writers who have delivered down to pos- 
terity the history of the Roman commonwealth. 
That those of the French are severe andinhumanj 
that they are enforced with a rigour unknown 
in any other age or country, too clearly ap^ 



5a 

pears from the details already given. And, in- 
deed, how could the sanctions of such a system 
be otherwise ? — View it in all the stages of its 
operation— it is every where cruel and iniqui- 
tous. 

The peasant is torn from the family which 
depends on his labour for subsistence. The 
ministers of tyranny regard not the lamentations 
of his disconsolate wife, of his helpless offspring 
or of his aged parents. He is dragged to the 
field of slaughter to fight the batdes of a despot, 
whom from his very inmost soul he abhors and 
execrates, to aid in fixing ruin more stedfastly 
on a blood-stained throne, to rivet his own gall- 
ing fetters more firmly. If, prompted by an 
" insurgent conciousness of right," the unhappy 
man makes an effort to release himself by flight 
from the iron grasp of military despotism, he 
only subjects himself and all who are dear to 
him, to more protracted torments. An enormous 
fine is levied on his property, or if he has none, 
on that of his parents, who have no control 
over his actions, no share in the offence. His 
paternal lands, or the savings of his happier 
years are swallowed by the devouring gulph of 
imperial rapacity. His relatives are turned out, 
houseless and moneyless, to encounter the cruel 
buffetings of an unpitying world ; or, on suspi- 
cion of connivance, are subjected to punishments 



5t' 

still more severe. If he be taken, either death, 
the last resource of the unhappy, releases him at 
once from his misery, or, he is condemned ta 
suffer a punishment of long protracted toil and 
ignominy— to drag on the sad remnant of his 
days in hopeless wretchedness. If, too wise 
to attempt an escape by flight from the all- 
searching despotism of his government, he sub- 
mits to his destiny, how dreary to him is the 
journey of 'ife ! — Cooped up, for years within 
the walls of some garrison-town, on the outskirts 
of the empire — -now suflFering all the horrors of 
famine in a blockaded fortress, and now dis- 
patched to another hemisphere to encounter pes- 
tilence and death, beneath a burning southetn 
sky, exposed in the campaigns of Europe, to 
the excessive toils and privations of a soldier's 
life — every where made to execute the com- 
mands of relentless tyranny and all-grasping cu- 
pidity — every where exposed to the midnight 
dagger of the exasperated peasantry — such is 
the life which the conscript sees before him in 
long perspective. A slave, for an unlimited 
time, to military law, through the gloomy vista 
of futurity he can see no prospect gilded by a 
ray of hope, no limitation of misery, no term be- 
yond which freedom and happiness will be his. 
Behold him in a foreign land, the victim of dis- 
ease or the sword, breathing out his spirit in. 



52 

groans and agony : — the dying man turns his 
wishful eyes towards the land of his nativity, to- 
wards the 

" Vine-covered hills and g.iy vallies of France," 

and spends his last breath in imprecating curses 
on the tyrant who has forever separated him 
from objects so dear. 

" Alas ! 

Nor wife, nor children more shall he behold, 
Nor friends, nor sacred home !" 

What could have been the motives which in- 
duced the French government to adopt, what 
can be the reasons which cause it, without ne- 
cessity, to persevere in so monstrous a system, 
a system discordant with the manners, habits, 
feelings and prejudices of every civilized peo- 
ple — a system which paralysis industry, arrests 
the progress of the arts and sciences, diffuses 
poverty and misery far and wide, and causes the 
great body of the people to abhor and detest 
their rulers ? Why has it fortified this system, 
odious and terrible in its " best estate," with so 
many cruel sanctions ? Why does it outrage the 
feelings of the people, and earn for itself a never- 
dying infamy, by punishing the innocent for the 
crimes of the guilty, by making parents respon- 
sible for the actions of their children, whom they 
have not seen for years, and who are, in many 
cases, separated from them by a thousand 



53 



leagues of ocean ? Must not the motive which 
induced it to adopt and persevere in a system 
so revoking to human nature, have been one of 
uncommon strength and cogency ? Yes : there 
is such a motive, a motive in which we shall find 
a ready answer to all these inquiries. France 
has long aimed at universal conquest. No other 
adequate motive can be assigned for the adoption 
of the system of conscription. The rulers of 
France were no doubt aware that it would de- 
stroy their popularity, and entail misery on their 
country ; but they also knew that it would en- 
able them to disregard the wishes of the people ; 
and they were willing to sacrifice the prosperity 
and happiness of France to the attainment of 
their great object. 

But the belief that they aim at universal con- 
quest rests on other and firmer grounds than 
the mere adoption of the system of conscription. 
It is established by the uniform tenor of their 
subsequent conduct. 

While the revolutionary government of '92 
was proclaimed to all Europe, that though 
it wished to break the chains of every people 
on the continent, it was unalterably determined 
not to attempt an extension of its territory, it 
was deliberately preparing to seize on the do- 
minions of the king of Sardinia. That old and 
feeble monarch had scarcely awaked from the 



54 



slumber of security into which the solemn de- 
clarations of the French government had lulled 
him, when he saw his country overrun by a re- 
publican army, and converted, by a decree of 
the national assembly, into a department of 
France.* This was the first overt act demon- 
strating a treasonable conspiracy, by the rulers 
of France, against the liberties of Europe and 
the world ; and as it involved in it an abandon- 
ment of the principles by which, they had just 
before solemnly declared they meant to be go- 
verned, it was no equivocal indication of the 
perfidious policy which they and their succes- 
sors have ever since so steadily pursued. 

Since that time the French government has 
directed all its efforts, and with but too great suc- 
cess, to the execution of the grand project. 
The unlimited command of the military popu- 
lation of France, conferred on it by the system 
of conscription, has enabled it almost uniformly 
to overpower its enemies by numbers. But 
great as was its superiority in the numerical 
force of its armies, to governments which de- 
pended on voluntary enlistment alone for the re- 
cruiting of theirs^ it has not owed its success to 
this superiority alone. It has excelled them as 
much in art and cunning, as it has exceeded them 

* The department of Mont Blanc. 



55 

in force. Profound hypocrisy, perfidy, the cor- 
ruption of the ministers of its enemies, the des- 
truction of the identity of government and peo* 
pie, by declaring itself hostile to the former, and 
friendly to the latter — these were the arts, these 
were the villanies which it successfully practised 
against the powers of Europe : — it was these 
which opened the way for its armies, which 
sometimes left them nothing more to do than to 
occupy an already conquered country. 

The hypocrisy of the French government was 
eminently displayed in its continual professions 
of philanthropy, regard to the rights of man, 
commiseration for the oppressions which the 
people of Europe suffered from their rulers, 
and disinterested concern for their welfare. 
How false and hollow-hearted were all these 
professions its conduct then and since has too 
clearly demonstrated. 

Nor is its perfidy less notorious. — -Did it not 
promise to the people of Holland and Switzer- 
land, of Genoa, of Venice, in short, of all the 
Italian states, liberty and happiness ? And did 
it perform its promises ? No : — it has insulted, 
plundered and enslaved them all. Who is bold 
enough to deny that the French government 
has acted perfidiously to Spain ? But it is use- 
less to multiply examples, to prove what is no- 
torious to all the world. 



56 

The corruption of the ministers of its ene- 
mies is another 'of the MachiaveUan arts of the 
government of France. Tiie author of a work 
not long since pubhshed,* has exhibited a mass 
of presumptive evidence sufficient to convince 
any unprejudiced mind that some of the princi- 
pal ministers of Austria, Prussia and Russia 
have long been in the pay of Napoleon and his 
revolutionary predecessors. 

But the art v^hich the French government 
applied, more successfully than any other, to 
the advancement of its grand scheme, was the 
affectation of waging war, not against the people 
of Europe, but in their favour, against the go- 
vernments, which it indiscriminately denounced 
as corrupt and tyrannical. This was in the first 
years of the war, when it still pretended to be 
fighting for liberty and the rights of man. In 
this way it enlisted thousands of deluded wretch- 
es, in every country, under its banners, and 
raised a host of domestic enemies against every 
government. 

All these nefarious arts, systematically employ- 
ed by the French government, are so many 
proofs of its unprincipled ambition, of its having 
formed a scheme of universal conquest. 

* Lewis Goldsmith's " History of the Cabinet of Bona* 
parte." 



^J1 

But'to multiply inferior proofs is needless. 
Why have the eagles of France carried desola- 
tioa through Europe, from the Baltic to the pil- 
lars of Hercules, from the Germanic ocean to the 
remotest shores of Italy ? Because a restless 
and insatiable ambition has directed their flight — 
because the revolutionary governors of France, 
from the affectedly philanthropic Brissot, to the 
ruthless, relentless, all-destroying Napoleon, 
however variant in their other plans, have all 
agreed in this, that France shall wage war 
against the liberties of the human race, until 
they bow in lowly reverence to her tyrannical 
sway. 

It is this scheme of universal conquest, I re- 
peat it, which occasioned the adoption of the 
system of compulsive military levy ; which has 
induced the emperor to retain it alone, of all the 
institutions of the republic, and to enforce it by 
so many cruel and outrageous sanctions, that a 
majority of the people of France have learnt to 
abhor and detest their government, and to vent 
curses " not loud but deep," against it, and its 
favourite measure, the system of conscription. 



58 



I HAVE now exhibited a picture, as faithful 
and exact as my feelings and prejudices would 
permit, of the military system of France. I have 
shewn that it originated in the boundless ambition 
of her rulers, and has been sustained to the pre- 
sent day, although loaded with the just execra- 
tions of the people, by the continued operation 
of the same powerful causes. Assuming it then 
as a fact, that France is actuated by this lawless 
spirit, it behoves those nations which still retain 
their independence, to inquire most diligently 
into the nature and extent of her power, and 
whether the enormous and blood-cemented fa- 
bric which she has reared on the ruins of Eu- 
ropean liberty and independence, is of a durable 
and permanent, or of a perishable and transitory 
nature. Without an accurate knowledge, as far 
as in the nature of things it is attainable, of 
these particulars, it is impossible for a govern- 
ment, at the present day, to form a wise and 
comprehensive system of national policy. So 
grt at is the power of France, so decided is her 
influence in the great family of nations, that any 
system of national policy, not predicated on a 
knowledge at once profound and comprehensive, 
of the nature, extent and probable duration of 
that power and influence, must be a wretched 
system of expedients, liable to continual change, 



59 

from the operation of unknown causes— even 
varying with the varying events of the hour. 

Akhough the writer of these pages does not 
pretend to possess this profound and comprehen- 
sive knowledge, he may nevertheless be allowed 
to institute an inquiry into the subject ; and he 
does so because he deems it of vital importance 
to his country, and because he hopes that his fee- 
ble effort, while it diffuses some little light, will 
elicit an abler investigation from some abler 
hand. But at the same time that he abjures 
every thing like a dogmatizing spirit, and as- 
sumes the humble garb of an inquirer after truth, 
he cannot, in all candour, avoid confessing that 
his inquiries have led him to a belief, that though 
the power of France, at present, is enormously 
great, it is of a transitory and perishable nature 
— that though she now threatens to destroy 
every vestige of liberty and independence 
throughout the civilized world, she will, before 
many years shall have elapsed, be reduced to 
her former rank among the powers of Europe. 

That the power of France is, at present, enor- 
mously great, will be denied by none. At all 
times great and powerful, she has, within eigh- 
teen years, nearly doubled her territory and po- 
pulation. She has embraced within the promoe- 
rium of her empire the whole of the low coun# 
tries, the jnost populous, the most industrious* 



and before it was blasted by French connexion-, 
the most commercial and wealthy section of con- 
tinental Europe. Within the same all-grasping 
line she has included a part of Germany, two 
thirds of Italy, and even a portion of the east- 
ern shore of the Adriatic. The republics of 
Holland, Venice and Genoa, the continental do- 
minions of the king of Sardinia, the grand 
dutchy of Tuscany, the estates of the Church 
— these are the independent states and ter- 
ritories which have been incorporated with 
France. 

As king of Italy, her emperor wears the iron 
crown of the ancient princes of Lombardy ; and 
his Italian subjects could tell, if they dared, that 
to the iron crown he added the iron sceptre of 
military despotism. 

Nominally as " Protector," but really as mas- 
ter, he governs the states which compose the 
"Confederation of the Rhine," including, a- 
mong others, the kingdoms of Bavaria, Wurt- 
emburg, Westphalia and Saxony. 

As "Mediator," his sovereign authority is 
acknowledged in ail the vallies of the once free 
and happy, but now enslaved and v/retched 
Switzerland. 

Naples, indebted to him for two upstart kings^ 
is as thoroughly subjected to his sway as if she 



61 

were, what, by a' single word he could at my 
time make her, a department of France. 

The kingdom of Prussia, which but half a 
century since, resisted successfully all the great 
Gontinental powers united, is completely sub ser" 
vient to his will. 

Austria humbled by his arms, but still more 
so by a disgraceful connexion, forced on her by 
the dread of political extinction^ is compelled, 
however reluctantly, to side with the tyrant. 

Denmark, by adopting, at his command^ the 
ruinous " continental system," has shewn that 
•she has not power or courage to resist him. 

The Swedes, will ere long be governed by 
one of his generals, whom the fear of his pow- 
er has compelled them to exalt to the dignity of 
crown-prince of the kingdom. 

Even Russia, since the time when the stand- 
ard of France was displayed on her frontiers, 
and glared on the sight of the timid Alexander, 
like a baleful meteor, boding ruin to his empire, 
has tremblingly pursued the line of policy dic- 
tated by Napoleon. 

Spain and Portugal, overrun by his armies, 
are engaged in a tremendous struggle for politi- 
cal: existence. 

Such is the picture which Europe presents to 
the eye of the observer, such are the external 



62 



appearances which France exhibits of resistless 
power. 

But it is not the vast extent of her territory, 
or the greatness of her population alone, which 
renders the power of France so formidable to 
Europe and the whole civilized world. The 
very despotism under which she groans has en- 
dued her with a " distempered energy." The 
nature of her government, practically more ab- 
solute than even those of Russia and Turkey, 
gives her an advantage in war, over every na- 
tion to which she is opposed. The emperor of 
France has the resources of his empire entirely 
and completely at his disposal. The system of 
conscription, one of the effects of the despotism 
of the government, by enabling him to multiply 
his armies at pleasure, seems of itself sufficient 
to invest him with irresistible power. 

To the revolution, and to the wars which 
have arisen out of it, France is indebted for the 
further advantage of having in her armies an 
unusual proportion of able commanders. The 
revolution, by levelling the artificial barriers 
which closed the avenues to distinction against 
the entrance of low-born genius, quickly enlist- 
ed in the service of the government all the tal- 
ents of the country, whether civil or military. 
Deprived of the adventitious aids of riches, 



6"3 

bifth and powerful connexions, sturdy folly and 
feeling imbecility could no longer force or worm 
their way into office and power : and though 

" Estates, degrees and offices 

Were" still *' derived corruptly," 

active talents were essential to their attainment. 
Underthis state of things many great villains arose 
to eminence, but a fool could scarcely be found 
adorned with the insignia of office. This, it is 
obvious, is an advantage which the other nations 
of Europe cannot possess, in an equal degree, 
without sustaining a revolution similar to that 
which conferred it on France ; a price too great 
to pay for any conceivable advantage. 

It is to the ability of her generals, more than 
to any peculiar excellence in her soldiers, that 
France is indebted for another advantage, I mean 
the reputation of superiority in arms, I had al- 
most said, of invincibility. The terror of her 
name has more than once effected objects for 
France, which her utmost efforts would have 
barely sufficed to attain. The army which be- 
lieves the one opposed to it superior to itself, in 
valour, in good fortune, in discipline, or in the 
ability of its commander, is already more than 
half defeated : while, on the contrary, that which 
believes in its own superiority, which proudly 
confides in its good fortune, confidently relies 
,on the ability of its commander^ and looks back 



64i 

to a loiij^ series of victories achieved by its valoi* 
— such an army is almost certain of victory. 
The portentous rapidity with which France a- 
chieved her nrst conquests in Italy and the Ne- 
therlands, invested her name with a halo of mi- 
litary renown, at which the nations of the conti- 
nent could not gaze withovtt astonishment and 
terror. No time was given them to recover from 
their fist panic : — blow followed blow in such 
ominous and rapid succession, that the bravest 
hearts began to quake, and a superstitious notion 
of the invincibility of their invaders, pervaded 
almost universally the minds of the vulgar. 

But even these are not all the points in which 
France is formidable : the power derived from 
all these sources is rendered still greater, still 
more efficient, by the perfidy of her government. 
The most earnest professions of friendship, the 
most solemn treaties of peace and amity, aiford 
no security against a sudden invasion by the mi- 
litary force of France. Professions of friendship, 
of regard, and even of '' Zoi^e "—treaties solemnly 
ratified, in the face of heaven — these are only 
the opiates which that perfidious government ad- 
ministers, to lull its victuns into a fatal sleep. 
They greedily swallow the gilded pill — they re- 
pose on the lap of false security — they dream 
that " the rights of a just nation are ever respect- 
ed" — that they will long enjoy the blessings of 



65 

tranquility, that their weahh and prosperity 
will continue to increase, " that it is a waste of 
the public treasure to prepare for wars which 
may never happen," such, and still more fantas- 
tic and absurd are their dreams, until they are 
suddenly awakened by 

• *■■ The neighing steed, the shrill trump," 

and the loud-thundering cannon of an invading 
enemy. Anon, they behold the pavements of 
their cities stained with the best blood of their 
country — they see the standard of France waving 
over the parapets of their fortresses — they see 
the smoke ascending from the rUins of the cities 
whose inhabitants had attempted a fruitless re- 
sistance. Their constitution and their laws are 
aboUshed : the code of Napoleon, whose fun- 
damental principle is blind obedience to the com- 
mands of a military despot, is every where pro- 
claimed ; enormous contributions are imposed ; 
in default of payment, the cottage, the palace 
and the consecrated temple are subjected to un- 
discrinating pillage, the grave itself is. forced to 
open 4ts " ponderous and marble all-devouring 
jaws," and disgorge its wealth. Ere long, vast 
tracts of country are seen, in which the pro- 
found and deathlike stillness of desolation, is 
interrupted only by the triumphant shouts of a 
brutal soldiery, or by the groans of their victims. 
This is not declamation, this is not hyperbole, 

10 



6Q 



alas ! it is history — and every Spaniard can tcH 
how true. 

Quis tali a fan do, 



Mvrmidonum, Dolopumve, aut duri miles Ulyssei, 
Temperet a lachrymis ? 

It is from the fatal sleep which may expose 
them to all these accumulated horrors that I 
would arouse my countrymen. But, alas ! my 
efforts will be fruitless. A warning voice has 
already cried aloud from the tombs of the de- 
parted European republics, telling them to be- 
ware of the arts of France — to distrust her pro- 
fessions — to avoid all connexion with her — to 
prepare, in time, for the defence of their liberty 
against her insidious attacks. They have not 
heard it — they still slumber. Would they but 
arise in their strength, and, armed at all points, 
watch with a jealous eye all the movements of 
this foe to the human race, the danger which 
now menaces them, might be averted. The 
black and lowering cloud which now threatens 
to pour its vengeance on them, would ere long 
be dissipated. The power of France is now 
tremendously great ; for a few years it will con- 
tinue so ; and during those few years, many are, 
the perils which surround every free and inde- 
pendent state. If they preserve their indepen- 
dence throughout the period of unnatural ener* 
gy which is allotted to France, they will have 



67 

■earned a long continuance of liberty and happi- 
ness. 

I have before said that " my inquiries have 
.led me to the belief, that though the power of 
France, at present, is enormously great, it is of 
a transitory and perishable nature: that, though 
she now threatens to destroy every vestige of 
liberty and independence, in the civilized world, 
she will, before many years shall have elapsed, 
be reduced to her former rank among the pow- 
ers of Europe." It is proper that 1 should here 
state the grounds of my belief. 

And, first, the testimony of all history shows 
that great conquests, which are rapidly effected, 
are rarely permanent ; and that those only are 
permanent which are effected by slow degrees. 
Indeed, it seems to be a law governing the 
whole moral and physical world, that those 
things which are suddenly produced are defi- 
cient in durability, while those are long-lived 
which attain to maturity slowly. It is agreed, 
for example, by ethical writers, that sudden re- 
formations in the morals are seldom lasting, 
while gradual ones are usually permanent. So, 
among plants, the mushroom which is produced 
in a night, in a few days fades away and per- 
ishes, while the sturdy oak, which attains not its 
growth in less than one hundred years, firmly 
rooted in its native mountain, defies the rage of 



6S 

the elements for centuries. Among animals, 
the ephemeron springs instantaneously into ma- 
turity, and in a few short hours is mingled with 
its parent dust ; while man, condemned to a lon- 
ger infancy than any other animal, exceeds them 
all in the duration of his life. 

Not to mention the events of remote antiqui- 
ty, which vague traditions rather than authentic 
history has transmitted to posterity, the noted 
example of the Macedonian conquests is one, 
among many proofs of the correctness of my 
position. Concerning these the testimony of 
history is copious and indisputable. In less 
than twelve years Alexander subdued all Asia 
Minor, the extensive Persian dominions in Up- 
per Asia and Africa, together with a part of In- 
dia, and erected on the ruins of the empire of 
Cyrus, one of still more ample dimensions. 
How soon did this unwieldly empire fall to 
pieces ! How quickly did Macedon lose her 
preponderance among the nations of that esra ! 
She sunk, as if exhausted by the efforts which 
she had made, into a state of inaction, and 
scarcely maintained her former rank in the 
world. 

Approaching nearer to modern times, we see 
in the empire of Charlemagne, another exempli- 
fication of the truth of this doctrine. France, 
under his auspices, became the mistress of Eu* 



69 



rope, and France, under \iis immediate succes- 
sor, voluntarily yielded precedence to Germany, 
whom her arms had not long before subdued. 

Passing again into the East, we see Gengis 
Khan, emerging from the desarts of Scythia, at 
the head of a tumultuary army, overturning 
empires and kingdoms in his course and reduc- 
ing all Asia to subjection. Like a frost-bear- 
ing wind from his own cold, inhospitable and 
dreary desarts, he blasted the fertile regions of 
southern Asia, and like the wind of the desart 
he passed quickly away. Had it not been for 
the tremendous desolation which his arms pro- 
duced, it would, in a few years, have been al- 
most forgotten that Gengis had wielded the 
sceptre of undivided Asia. His immediate suc- 
cessors, after having converted one of the finest 
portions of the globe into a howling wilderness, 
retired into the boundless desarts of the north. 

The conquests of Tamerlane were as sud- 
denly effected, and they were scarcely more per- 
manent. Almost every country in Asia was 
subdued by his arms ; Hindostan alone remain- 
ed to his descendants. 

It is no less true, that of the great empires 
formed by conquest, those have been most per- 
manent which have been most gradually formed. 
The Roman empire in ancient, and the Turkish 
in modern times, afford evidence of the fact. 



70 

The former was more than eight hundred years 
attaining its growth, and four hundred more pas- 
sed by before it was 

" Push'd from its wide ambitious base," 

by the furious and unremitted efforts of the 
northern barbarians : a duration unparalleled, 
except by China, in the history of the world. 

The Turkish empire, founded in the thir- 
teenth century, conquered and incorporated 
province after province in slow succession, for 
the space of one hundred and fifty years : nearly 
four hundred more have elapsed ; and it still 
repels the assaults of its enemies — it still exhi- 
bits tokens of vigour, v/hich, unless it should 
be overwhelmed with the lava which still pours 
from the revolutionary volcano of France, will 
preserve its existence till centuries more have 
rolled by. 

These few examples, selected from many, 
afford evidence of the correctness of the asser- 
tion that " great conquests which are rapidly 
effected are rarely permanent, and that those 
only are permanent which are effected by slow 
degrees." The reason is obvious. When a 
warlike people, roused into action by ambitious 
rulers, suddenly overruns and conquers a terri- 
tory more extensive than their own, the empire 
thus formed is composed of heterogeneous and 
discordant elements, nearly equal in physical 



71 

force, which cannot, by any human power be 
made to harmonize. The conquering people is 
not numerous enough to infuse its spirit into, to 
stamp its character on the conquered, and, by 
thus assimilating them to their conquerors to 
make the yoke sit lightly on them. Throughout 
the whole conquered territory — in all its pro- 
vinces, their former independence is still remem- 
bered ; — one sentiment pervades them all — for 
time has accustomed none of them to bear a fo- 
reign yoke with patience. Perceiving that their 
physical force is as great as that of their con- 
querors, their discontents at length assume the 
form of rebellion : — by common consent, and by 
a general simultaneous effort they throw off the 
yoke which has been imposed upon them. 

In empires, on the contrary, which are formed 
by slow degrees, each conquered province, when 
added to the empire, forms but a small part of the 
whole, and its spirit and character are emerged in 
that of the conquerors. It sees no newly subjugat- 
ed territory, impatient of the yoke, from which it 
might hope for assistance in a struggle againstits 
conquerors : its physical force is inferior to theirs 
— it is compelled to submit to its destiny— it loses 
the feelings of independence, and learns to identify 
its interests and its character with those of the 
empire of which it forms a part, and with which 
it is now completely amalgamated. In a few 



72 



years another province is added and goes thro 
similar process. Thus does the gradual mode 
of its formation confer durability on an empire : 
and thus does the rapidity with which great con- 
quests are effected, afford a clear indication of 
their approaching loss. 

If I have succeeded in shewing that history 
and reason concur in supporting the position, 
that great conquests rapidly effected, are rarely 
permanent, then have I developed one of the 
principles of destruction interwoven in the fabric 
of French power, and exhibited one of my rea- 
sons for believing that power to be " of a per- 
ishable and transitory nature." 

The principle of instability which I have just 
stated, is one common to all great and sudden 
conquests. I now proceed to state reasons for 
doubting the permanence of French power, de- 
duced from the peculiar situation and circum- 
stances of France. And I doubt not I shall be 
able to show, that many of her sources of power 
are completely dryed up, and that others are 
fast failing. 

I have before stated that in the first years of 
the revolution, the French government derived 
from the sale of the estates of the clergy, and the 
consequent emission of assignats, and from the 
sale of the confiscated estates of the emigrants^ 
pecuniary means of an almost incalculable 



amount. Money has been emphatically said to 
constitute " the sinews of modern warfare; " 
and the amazing energy of the French military 
operations, during the first years of the revo- 
lution, while their extraordinary supplies lasted, 
evinces the correctness of the position. The 
jacobin government, in one thousand seven hun- 
dred and ninety four, arrayed one million, four 
hundred thousand men on the frontiers of 
France. Who, knowing this, will wonder that 
the nations of Europe were appalled, and that 
the republicans, every where out-numbering 
their enemies, rapidly extended their conquests ? 
But these pecuniary means, great as they were, 
were dissipated in a few years, by the bound- 
less profusion of public expenditure, and the 
infamous embezzlements of all the successive 
rulers of France. 

After the assignats were 'cried down, and en- 
tirely banished from circulation, after the im- 
mense sums arising from the sale of the con- 
fiscated estates were expended, another pecuni- 
ary resource, scarcely less ample, remained to 
France. I allude to the contributions levied by 
her armies on the countries which had been 
either subjugated by force, or induced by her 
hypocritical professions, to form a connexion 
with her. Every man who has read a narrative 
U 



74 

of the wars which have arisen out of the Frenclf 
revolution, whether regularly compiled by the 
historian, or doled out to the greedy appetite of 
curiosity, in the columns of our political jour- 
nals, must know with what unblushing rapacity, 
enormous contributions of money, clothes and 
provisions, were levied on the inhabitants of 
every country, whether friendly b' hostile, into 
which the armies of France found entrance. 
War, as it was carried on by the European 
states, for two centuries before the French revo- 
lution, never failed to exhaust the finances, 
even of the victorious nation. But the wars of 
revolutionary Fraiice against the continental 
powers, for a long- time, not only supported her 
military establishment, but replenished her 
treasury.. 

The Italian peninsula, the people of which al- 
most every where received the invading French 
with open arms, hailed them as deliverers, and 
embraced tbem as brethren, was, in a few years, 
stripped of every species of moveable wealth, 
and reduced to a state of abject poverty and 
wretchedness. The spendid monuments of 
their ancient glory, which could by any possi- 
bility be removed, and the exquisite works, in 
painting and sculpture of their modern artists, 
were ravished from the degenerate ItahanSj,. 



7o 



together with their merchandize and their mo- 
ney, by these undiscriminating plunderers. 

In Holland also a majority of the people 
were favourable to the progress of the French 
arms, and received their invaders with every 
demonstration of stupid and extravagant joy. 
Yet has that nation, by a long series of infa- 
mous exactions, enforced at the point of the 
bayonet, been entirely deprived of its immense 
wealth, accumulated by the unremitted industry 
of more than two hundred years. 

In the same manner the nations which oppos- 
ed the encroachments of France, were compelled 
to furnish to her armies contributions of mo- 
ney, clothes and provisions, only limited by 
their means of payment. In this respect the 
open enemies of France fared not worse than 
her friends ; for both were plundered to the ut- 
most point of endurance. The ten provinces 
in the Netherlands, and all the provinces of 
Germany, have contributed in this way, to the 
support of the armies and to the replenishment 
of the treasury of France, 

Spain and Portugal contributed their quotas 
likewise ; not in the shape of military contribu- 
tions, levied on every city town and village, but 
in the form of a tribute paid by the government 
- — the price of French forbearance. Portugal, 



76 

relying somewliat on British protection, and 
more remote from danger than Spain, contri- 
buted less than the latter in p^roportion to her 
means. But Spain, poor, degraded, degenerate 
Spain ; for such she then was, after the dis- 
graceful peace of one thousand seven hundred 
and ninety-six, poured all her pecuniary, mili- 
tary and naval means into the lap of France. 
The treasures of the new world were as much 
relied upon by Napoleon, as if the provinces 
from which they were derived had been his 
exclusive and undisputed property. 

Of the pecuniary resources which I have 
enumerated, all have failed except the single one 
of military contribution, and that is well nigh 
exhausted. The continent of Europe, desolat- 
ed by long continued wars, impoverished to the 
last degree by the enactions of France and by 
the anti-commercial system which the emperor 
has forced it to pursue, can no longer yield food 
for the avidity of its tyrants. Italy and Hol- 
land, as before stated, vv^ere long since stripped 
of all their superfluities ; and the campaigns of 
one thousand eight hundred and five, six, seven 
and nine, completed the impoverishment of Ger- 
many. Arrears of the contributions imposed 
upon Prussia by France, in one thousand eight 
hundred and seven, remain still unpaid, be- 



77' 

cause that desolated and ruined kingdom is ab- 
solutely unable to discharge them. The plun- 
der of Spain, one of the poorest countries in 
Europe, has not sufficed for the support of the 
armies necessarily kept up in that country. 
From these facts it is evident France will hereaf- 
ter derive but small supplies from military con- 
tributions, even if she should remain as she 
now is, proudly preeminent on the continent. 
She has already reaped the harvest ; the glean- 
ings only remain. 

She must then, like other nations, depend 
hereafter on regular revenue and on loans. Let 
us consider these separately. 

The budget of one thousand eight hundred 
and six* states the receipts of the treasury in 
that year to have been one thousand one hun- 
dred and thirty three millions two hundred and 
thirty three thousands six hundred and ninety 
one francs ; or about two hundred and twelve 
millions of dollars. I derive this fact, and in- 
deed a great part of the little information which 
I possess on the subject, from Mr. Walsh's very 
able " View of the taxation of the French em- 
pire." It appears from the whole tenor of his 
statements, and they deserve the fullest credit, 

* There is the best reason to believe that the revenue of 
France has not since then increased. 



78 

that the sum abovementioned is not raised in 
France without the utmost extremity of fiscal 
oppression. There is scarcely a conceivable 
■subject of taxation which the ingenuity of the 
French financiers has not discovered ; and their 
exactions have almost reached the ne plus ultra, 
the point beyond which military despotism it- 
self cannot go with safety. — '^ Gentz, who had 
attentively studied the financial system of the 
imperial government of France, speaks of it in 
the year eighteen hundred and six" as " a ma- 
chine wound up to such a pitch as almost to 
make its strings crack." I am well satisfied from 
my own observation, of the accuracy of this 
opinion. The French people are absolutely 
saturated with taxes."- — Letter on the Genius 
and Disposition, ^c. page 203. 

It results from these facts, that it would be 
difficult, nay impossible for the government to 
increase its annual revenue, derived from taxa- 
tion. The deplorable state of the interior of 
France leads us to the same conclusion. 

" Combined with the evils which I have alrea- 
dy had occasion to notice" (says Mr. Walsh, p. 
88 of the same work) "various other causes 
conspired to heighten the national calamity. — 
The extinction of all public spirit and of the in- 
fluence of public opinion — the depopulation 



79 

and decay of the great towns — -the dedine of 
agricuhure and manufactures — the stagnation 
of internal trade — the stern dominion of a mi» 
litary poHce — incessantly checked the exulta- 
tion natural to the mind, on viewing the profu- 
sion of bounties with which the hand of provi- 
dence has gifted this fine region. The pressure 
of taxes was aggravated by the most oppressive 
rigour in the collection. The peasant or far- 
mer who was delinquent in paying his taxes, 
had a file of soldiers, under the name of garni- 
sers, quartered upon him, who consumed the 
fruits of his industry, as a compensation for the 
loss sustained by the state. The grape, in 
numberless instances, was permitted to rot on 
the vine, in consequence of the inability of the 
proprietor, either to dispose of his wine when 
made, or to discharge the imposts levied upon 
every stage of the process of making it. I was 
credibly informed that families were frequently 
compelled to relinquish their separate establish- 
ments, and to associate in their domestic econo- 
my, in order to lighten, by dividing, the burthen 
of the taxes.'* 

The effects of the loss of external trade were 
every where visible : — in the commercial cities 
half deserted, and reduced to a state of inac- 
tion and gloom truly deplorable : — in the inland 



80 



towns in which the populace is eminently 
wretched, and where I saw not one indication 
of improvement, but on the contrary numbers 
of edifices falling into ruin : — on the high- 
roads where the infrequency of vehicles and 
travellers denoted but too strongly the decrease 
of internal consumption, and the languor oF in- 
ternal trade ; and among the inhabitants of the 
country, particularly of the south, whose po- 
verty is extreme, in consequence 'of the exor- 
bitant taxes, and of the want of an outlet for 
their surplus produce. In one thousand eight 
hundred and seven, the number of mendicants in 
the inland towns was almost incredible. The 
condition of the peasantry, as to their food, 
clothing and habitations, bore no comparison 
with the state of the same class in England. 

" The interior of the French empire" (page 
203) " affords no promise of the possibility of 
collecting herafter a more abundant revenue than 
that which is now wrung from the people. The 
pressure of their actual burthens obstruct the 
growth of future resources." 

May we not safely go further than Mr. 
Walsh, and say that so long as the state of 
things which he describes shall continue, the 
revenue of France will not only not increase, 
but must necessarily diminish ? — Nay, I doubt 



81 

aot, that it has already begun to dimmish : for 
though no deficit is acknowledged in that mock- 
ery of the forms of a free government, the an- 
nual budget, it is observable in the diminished 
energy of the military operations in Spain and 
Portugal. 

Can the French government then resort to 
loans, the usual resource of governments whose 
revenue is unequal to their wants ? — -It cannot: 
for it is without the requisite credit. The refu- 
sal of the directorial government, in one thou- 
sand seven hundred and ninety six to redeem the 
assignats, even at their depreciated current va- 
lue, or to make any compromise whatever with 
the holders — the reduction of the national debt, 
in the same year, to one third of its original 
amount, by a mere ^rrette — but above all, the 
notorious bad faith of the present government, 
evinced in all its transactions, have destroyed 
in France every vestige of public credit. The 
government of that country is precisely in the 
situation of a notorious swindler, whom nobody 
will trust, however fair his promises, however 
plausible his representations, however extensive 
his means. 

But if it even possessed the requisite credit, 
of whom would it borrow P^Military exactions 
and anti-commercial decrees have annihilated 
the wealth of the continent : there, is no longer. 

12 



as 

a raonied capital in France or in her numerotas 
dependencies, commenburate with the wants of 
the government which tyrannizes over them all. 
Honest governments only can procure loans, 
and rich countries only can afford to lend the 
immense sums which the extravagance of mo- 
dern governments demand. 

Assuming these, then, as facts — that the re- 
sources oi paper money and domestic confiscation 
have entirely failed — that that oiforeigfi plunder 
is nearly' exhausted — that the regular revenue 
must inevitably decline — and that loans cannot 
be effected — will France be able much longer to 
support a military establishment large enough 
to retain the warlike nations of Europe in sub- 
jection? — Can she finish the conquest of that 
continent, and retain it in slavery, with a reve- 
nue far less than that which Britain employs in 
active and unremitted efforts to preserve the in- 
dependence of the nations which still nobly 
maintain the struggle, and to emancipate those 
which are under a cruel thraldom ? — These arc 
momentous questions :-they are questions which 
time only can with certainty answer. But when 
\ve consider how vast, how surpassing all com- 
putation were the pecuniary means with which 
the conquests of France were effected, we have, 
I thnik, good grounds to believe that they can- 
not be retained by means comparatively so small. 



83 

The testimony of the judicious and eloquent 
Walsh will illustrate this topic also. " Their 
means"* (says he, p. 20S) "would be altogether 
inadequate to the entire support of the immense 
armies in the pay of the government. The 
public expenses are more than equal to the rev- 
enue which is drawn from the interior of the 
empire. Foreign booty therefore, as I have 
before suggested, is a necessary resource, in or- 
der to enable the government to support the 
armies with which its own existence is indisso- 
lubly connected." 

In the failure then, of the pecuniary resour- 
ces of France, and in the consequent reduction 
of her military establishment, we see further 
grounds for the belief that her power is of a 
transitory and perishable nature. 

But these are not the only resources of 
France which have been diminished by a war- 
fare of eighteen years continuance. If we may 
believe the best informed writers on. the sub- 
ject, the military population of that country has 
been greatly diminished by the enormous 
draughts which have within a few years been 
made on it ; in other words, its natural increase 
has not been equal to the waste of war. " In 
one thousand eight hundred and seven" (says 

* Those of the French people. 



84 

Mr. Walsh, page 192) " the fields were princi- 
pally caltivated by women ;* the long succes- 
sion of wars having swept away that male pop- 
ulation which, under the auspices of a pacific 
government, would now have been the instru- 
ment of an unequalled production of the best 
fruits of the earth." 

He cites, in a note, the authority of Puchetj 
the French statistical writer, to shew the " dimi- 
nution of the relative male population in sever- 
al departments, owing partly to the havoc made 
by the armies," and partly to the military levies. 
The government of France not content with ex- 
pending its annual revenue in money, and the 
annual increase of its subjects, but hurried on 
by an impetuous and cruel ambition, has en- 
croached upon its capital, and waged war with 
all its resources of men and money. 

The introduction, within the last three years, 
of such a multitude cf foreigners, into the ar- 
mies of France, seems to countenance the pre- 
sumption that the government is unable to re- 
cruit them with native subjects. The impolicy 
of teaching the conquered nations the art of 
war must be obvious to the government of 
France ; and no adequate cause for the adop- 



* Mr. Bygge, a learned Dane, who travelled through 
France in 1798, makes a similar siatement. 



85 



tion of so impolitic a measure can be discover- 
ed, but the difficulty of procuring men at home, 
in consequence of the failure of the male popu- 
lation. When imperial Rome began to recruit 
her legions from among the half-subdued tribes 
on her frontier, the military art decayed at 
home : whole armies revolted, and employed in 
the destruction of her power, 'the skill and dis- 
cipline which they had acquired under her ban* 
ners. As it was with ancient Rome, so may it be 
with modern France. 

But other substantial reasons may be advanc- 
ed in support of my position. The conquests 
of France have been effected over nations 
whose energies had been paralyzed by the con- 
currence of a multitude of causes, but which are, 
nevertheless naturally brave, are now become 
warlike, and only wait for a favourable opportu- 
nity to exert against- their tyrants that strength 
which is unquestionably sufficient to relieve them 
from a galling yoke. 

A short time before theFrench revolution a de- 
cay of the military spirit, produced chiefly by the 
long peace which preceded that memorable eera, 
was visible in almost everycountry of continental 
Europe. But it was not the military spirit only, 
which, at that period, had suffered decay. In 
a great portion of Europe, all the noblest and 
best faculties of man had degenerated. A com- 



86 

bination of moral and physical causes, so nu* 
jnerous ^and complex, that volumes might be 
filled with the detail of them, of which, however, 
bad government and a degrading superstition 
were probably the most operative, had reduced 
the people of the two great European penin- 
sulas to a state of deplorable imbecilit}^ 

In Spain, it is true, some feeble efforts had 
t>een made, during the preceding twenty years, 
to improve the condition of the people — to in- 
vigorate agriculture and commerce and to exalt 
the character of the nation : but they had been 
projected on a limited scale, and had been attend- 
ed with little success. The great mass of the 
people were still in a deplorable situation. The 
spirit which had animated the bosoms of their 
ancestors, which had so long checked the Ro- 
mans when in the full tide of conquest — which 
had expelled the warlike Moors, after a furious 
and long protracted struggle — which, even in 
modern times, had covered the Spanish name 
with glory, and made Europe tremble for her 
safety — that spirit was, to all appearance dead, 
never to revive. 

Portugal was still lower in the scale of na- 
tional character. Governed by a dynasty ol 
imbecile monarchs, whose grovelling souls nev- 
er dared to emulate the great example of the 
Johns and the Henries who had preceded them, 



87 

-^cursed with an abject, base and cowardly no- 
bility — with an arrogant, avaricious, ignorant 
clergy, the people of this wretched country had 
almost sunk to the lowest point of degredation. 
The utmost degree of their courage was display- 
ed in thrusting the midnight dagger into the 
unguarded bosom of a foe — their religion eva- 
porated in empty pageantry, or was displayed in 
tormenting and burning at the stake some unfor- 
tunate heretic — their love was a gross and beast- 
ly sensuality — the crime not to be named by 
modest lips was committed by men of every de- 
gree.-~Such was the condition of the south- 
western peninsula of Europe. 

Nor was Italy much higher in national cha- 
racter. The arts and the sciences, it is true, still 
lingered on her shores, as if loth to abandon a 
country, once their favourite abode ; but they 
languished and seemed ready to expire. The 
picture of Italian degeneracy, corruption, frivo- 
lity and sensuality, which Goldsmith, in his 
" Traveller," had drawn with a master's hand, 
was still but too correct. 

In the north, the Hollanders, once the brave 
opposers of tyranny, and the proudest bulwark 
of the liberties of Europe, were sunk into an 
apathy the most profound. There the struggle 
between the love of glory and of money had 
long since terminated, and avarice, now without 



88 

riv^al or competitor, ruled despotically in ever/ 
bosom. Their naval and military establish- 
ments, long neglected, had fallen into decay, and 
now subserved no other purpose than to afford 
sine-cure offices to the favorites of a corrupt and 
feeble government. The little energy which 
was left was exclusivsly devoted to the accumu- 
lation of wealth, and this sordid appetite for 
gold had nearly destroyed that morality for 
which the Hollanders were once pre-eminently 
distinguished. 

The Swiss, though they retained much of 
their ancient purity and simplicity of manners, 
were divided by a factitious spirit, and were suf-^ 
ferring under the effects of too long continued 
peace and tranquility. As a nation they had 
taken no part in the wars of Europe in the two 
hundred years which preceded the French revo- 
lution ; and the martial spirit of the people had 
of course declined and become almost extinct. 
Never was the correctness of that filthy re- 
mark, " perpetual peace converts men into 
beasts of burthen" — more forcibly illustrated 
than in the case of Switzerland. 

Germany, whose population has always been 
brave and v/arlike, was governed, at the sera 
which we are considering, almost universally 
by weak and irresolute princes. Without union, 
without confidence in each other, v/ithout ener- 



m 



gy or coiiefeit- either in devising or executing 
their plans of operation, they were ill prepatf^d 
to withstand' the re voKitiohary-- torrent which 
suddenly Biirst in upon them. 

Most of the nations '6^ Europe moreover, la- 
boured under certain disadvantages inseparable 
from long established monarchical governments. 
Aristocratic "distinctions had deprived them of 
the services of many who were fitted by nature 
for those stormy and tempestuous times. Birth, 
riches' and influential connexions, had in all of 
them too great a share in exalting men to the 
highest civil and military stations. The conse- 
quence was, that these were often filled by men 
of very slender capacity — by men, who though 
they might steer the national' ship aright while 
the winds and the waves were propitious, had 
neither courage nor skill sufficient to navi^ 
gate her safely through storms and tempests, 
among rocks and shoals. This was one of the 
multitude of causes whose combined operation 
palsied the energies of almost every nation of 
continental Europe. 

Such having been the condition and circum- 
stances of most of the nations of Europe, at the 
sera of the Erench reVblution, instead of being 
surprised that they have been unable to resist 
the ariris of France, we have ratiier cause to 



wonder that they have maintained the struggle 
so long. 

But the character and, drcum stances of the 
European nations have been materially changed 
by eighteen years of warfare. They have %een 
taught in the school of adversity, and have ac- 
quired that energy which it confers on nations 
as well as on individuals. The shrill clarion of 
war has aroused their dormant faculties. How 
different are the Spaniards now, from the Span- 
iards who, a few years since, humbled them- 
selves at the feet of France, and besought her 
to grant them a disgraceful peace ! Driven to 
desperation by the perfidy and oppressions of 
Nappleo^i, they have aroused themselves from 
the slumber of ages, and have determined to 
resume their former rank among the nations of 
the earth. The standard of independence has 
been unfurled, and thousands, from every pro- 
vince, have rallied around it.^ Recollecting that 
at no distant aera their fathers were free, they 
have resolved that, henceforth, they will obey 
neither a domestic nor a foreign tyrant. While, 
therefore, they proclaim their loyalty to Ferdi- 
nand the s,eventh, they ?ivow their fixed deter- 
mination to restrain his authority within legiti- 
mate bounds, and to restore the ancient free 
constitution of their country, with new banners 



against the eneroachments of arbitrary power ; 
And 

*' having once conceived the glowing thought 



" Of freedom, they in that hope possess 
" All that the contest calls fur, spirit, strength, 
*' The scorn of danger, and united hearts, 
" The surest presage of the good they seelc." 

Avarice, effeminacy and cowardice, like a 
passing thought, have fled away. In their place 
we behold generosity bordering on profusion, 
a patient endurance of hardships, and an heroic 
contempt of danger and of death. We have 
seen individuals sacrifice their all to prop the 
falling fortunes of their country : — we have 
seen an undisciplined peasantry obstinately 
maintaining an unequal conflict with the vete- 
ran legions which had subdued the warlike 
nations of the north : — we have seen even the 
softer sex emulous of the fame of patriotism, 
and entreating admission into the ranks, that 
they might assist in rescuing their beloved coun- 
try from an odious tyranny. 

Even the Portuguese have caught the sacred 
enthusiasm, and are undergoing a moral and 
political regeneration* They now dare to de- 
fend the country which three years since, like 
dastards, they surrendered without resistance 
to their invaders. Who would then have be- 
lieved that the cowards who trembled at the very 
name of a Frenchman, could be converted into 



gallant soMiers, could be made to withstand 
the most furious onsetsof the legions of France^ 

" In .he f 'ir field of fighting men?" 

Nevertheless, such tilings are : such effects 
have been produced on the most degraded peo- 
ple of Europe, by the tyranny of France. 

What then may we not expect from the brave 
and warlike inhabitants of Germany and the 
north ?— When the time shall arrive, and arrive 
it must, when the continually increasing op- 
pressions of France shall compell them/to take 
U[p arms, will not the recollection of all their ac- 
cumulated vvTongs endue them with more than 
mortal energy ? — Will they not remember the 
" incalculable and heart-struck evils" inflicted 
on them by France — the wanton devastation of 
their fruitful fields — the pillaging and burning 
of their habitations — the profanation of the 
temples of their religion — the slaughter of their 
friends and kinsmen — and the violation of 
their wives and daughters ? — And will not such 
recollections render them invincible ? — Who 
can doubt that the inhabitants of the conquered 
countries loathe, abominate and abhor their 
conquerors ? — Are they men .? — And have they 
not human passions ? — Have they paissons ? — 
And do they not love their wives, tiieir children 
and tneir friends, and hate the tyrants who in- 



93 

fiict'misery and death itself on the objects of 
their love ? — Will not the operation of these 
powerful feelings at length rouse them to arms ? 
— it must, it will. 

The noble example of Spain is before their 
eyes : with a mute eloquence it exhorts them to 
remember that they are men— that they have 
rights — and that their tyrant is not omnipotent. 
The charm of French invincibility is dissolved. 
During three successive campaigns the Spa- 
niards have withstood the utmost efforts of 
France, and they may still proudly say that they 
have a country. What though the armies of 
their ferocious enemy are in possession of their 
principal cities, and lay waste the plains of Cas- 
tile and Andalusia, the spirit of independence 
yet lives in their bosoms — they cherish it amid 
the rocks and glens of their ruggid mountains. 
An inextinguishable hatred of their tyrants con- 
tinually urges them on to deeds of noble daring 
— the legions of Napoleon waste away before 
their impetuous and oft-repeated attacks. At 
length, but after a long and furious struggle, 
Spain will be free. But it is not only by the 
example of Spain that the nations of Europe 
are encouraged to rebel against the tyranny of 
France : they have, in the generous and noble 
conduct of Great Britain to the Spaniards and 



94 



Portuguese, a sure pledge of her determination; 
to aid, to the utmost extent of her means, every 
nation on the continent which shall be bold 
enough to conceive "the glowing thought of 
freedom." The conduct of Britain to Spain 
and Portugal is above all praise. When the 
"accusing spirit" shall convey to "heaven's 
chancery" a detail of the arrogance, of the ob- 
stinacy and of the injustice of Britain, the " re- 
cording angel," recollecting the aid so gene- 
rously yielded to Spain and Portugal in their 
utmost need, shall " drop a tear and blot it out 
forever." 

The sure prospect of aid from an ally so ge- 
nerous and so powerful will hasten the hour of 
a general insurrection of the enslaved people of 
the continent against French supremacy. With 
a cause so righteous — with a superiority of phy- 
f>ical force, aided by the enthusiasm which a 
struggle for liberty never fails to produce, how 
could they be otherwise than successful ?-^=^ 
France will no doubt call forth all her energy to 
retain them in subjection ; but all her energy 
will be exerted in vain against nations who will 
have experienced her tyranny to be insufferable, 
and will have determined to relieve themselves 
from it or perish in the attempt. 



m 

I have now stated my reasons for believing^ 
that the power of France is of a perishable and 
transitory nature. After adducing the evidence 
of history to prove that great conquests,, which 
like those of France, are rapidly effected, are 
yarely permanent-— I proceeded to shew that of 
her pecuniary resources, those of confiscation, 
paper money and tribute have entirely failed— 
that the resource of plunder is nearly exhaust* 
ed, and that the inore permanent one of reve- 
nue by taxation, has diminished and must con* 
tinue to diminish until the present impoverishing 
system shall be abandoned. I have shewn that 
her population is insufficient to recruit the enor- 
mous military establishment requisite to keep 
Europe in awe, and that she has been com- 
pelled to resort to the dangerous expedient of 
enlisting foreign soldiers under her banner. I 
have shewn that the people of Europe are no 
longer that feeble and degenerate race which a 
few years since bowed before the supremacy 
of France ; but that they have, on the contrary, 
acquired energy and courage in the school of 
adversity and in the midst of reiterated defeats, 
that they are impatient of the yoke, and ardent- 
ly desire to be relieved from it — ^-that the suc- 
cessful resistance of Spain, and the hope of aid 
from Britain will, in all probability, ere long 



96 



rouse them to a^ms — and that in a struggle for 
independence they have every chance of suc- 
cess. 

Nevertheles, it is not probable that the pow- 
er of France will in live, in ten, or even in 
twenty years, be reduced within its ancient 
limits. The causes which will produce this 
effect are not sufficiently powerful to pro- 
duce it suddenly. The intervening period will 
be one of terror and alarm to every nation with- 
in reach of the arms of France ; for she can 
spread the most terrible desoladon over coun- 
tries, which, she is unable finally to subdue. 
More especially will it be dangerous to coun- 
tries, which, like our own, are without an effi- 
cient military constitution, without a naval force 
to meet the squadrons of an enemy on the 
ocean, and ward off invasion — and, worse than 
all, wnich are ruled by men without energy or 
wisdom sufficient for so momentous a crisis. 

It is far from improbable, that the contemp- 
tuous opinion entertained of us by the tyrant of 
France, who has pronounced us to be a nation 
" without just political views, without honour 
and without energy," may induce him to sieze 
the first favourable opportunity of conveying an 
army to our shores. Though I am deeply con- 
scious of the incurable weakness which the 



97 

existence of a vast body of slaves in the south, 
entails on that portion of the union, and though 
I fear much from the want of energy in our ru- 
lers, I am too proudly confident of the heredi- 
tary bravery of my countrymen, to fear the final 
result of such a conflict, to doubt that it would 
be such a result, that thenceforth, the armies of 
Europe would. 

■ " shun our fatal shores.'' 

But we need only cast our eyes toward Europe, 
groaning in agony, and bleeding at every pore, 
to be convinced how terrible would be the ca- 
lamities which would attend a warfare in the 
bosom of our country, with the cruel and rapa- 
cious hordes of France. 

May the benignity of Heaven avert from us 
calamities so dreadful ' — May we remain, as 
heretofore, a free, a favoured and a happy peo- 
ple ! 



14 



APPENDIX. 



Note to page 25. 



THE military system of the Romans is bet^ 
ter known than that of any other ancient people. 
All the institutions of that warlike and ambi- 
tious republic were predicated on the idea of uni* 
versal conquest ; but in the mode of raising its 
armies that project was more especially discern- 
ible. The ambitious views of the Romans 
could not be accomplished without placing at 
the disposal of the government the whole mili- 
tary population of the country ; and hence their 
unnecessary perseverance in the system of 
compulsive levy — a system absolutely incom- 
patible (as practised by them) with that liberty 
which they flattered themselves they enjoyed — 
with that liberty whose name so often resound- 
ed through the forum and the capitol, in the 
turbulent harangues of the Gracchi, and in the 
elegant declamations of Cicero, with that liberty 



which was heard of every where, but existed 
no where. 

The Roman consuls were entrusted with the 
power of determining annually the number of 
men which should be levied at home, and the 
number which should be furnished by the Itali- 
an states, which, in the time of the republic, 
were nominally allied, but really subjected to, 
Rome. When the number had been determin- 
ed on, the consuls communicated their orders 
to the magistrates of the municipal towns, and 
issued an edict at Rome, appointing a day for 
the levy or conscription. On the appointed day 
the citizens assembled at the capitol : — the or- 
der, in which the tribes should stand the selec- 
tion, was then determined by lot. The tribe al- 
lotted for the first selection divided itself into its 
proper centuries, from each of which, in its turn, 
the military tribunes selected, man by man, a 
number proportioned to that of the century. 
After a selection had thus been made from the 
first tribe, the rest succeeded in the allotted or- 
der, and the same process was gone through 
with each. The persv)ns thus arbitrarily select- 
ed by the tribunes, were compelled to serve in 
armies of the republic, and if they proved re- 
fractory, were punished, at the discretion of the 
consul, with stripes, fine or imprisonment. 



101 

Every citizen, between the ages of seventeen 
and fifty,* was liable to this selection or con- 
scription, eiccept, 

1. Those who held civil or sacred offices 
which they could not conveniently relinquish : 

2. Those who had already served through 
tvirenty campaigns : 

3. Those who had been exempted from liabi- 
lity to the conscription on account of extraordi- 
nary merit : and 

4. Those who laboured under physical dis- 
abilities. 

These were the regulations which governed 
the levy of the Roman infantry, until the time 
of Marius, who, during the anarchy produced 
by his contest with Sylla, introduced into the 
Roman legions all the rabble of Italy, and all 
the fugitives from the provinces. 

The cavalry of the Roman army, at the same 
calamitous period, was composed exclusively of 
knights (esquires.) Romulus, after forming a 
senate of an hundred venerable old men, selected 
for their wisdom and probity, laid the founda- 
tion of another order in the state, by chosing 
three hundred of the bravest and most reputable 

* Livy, a Roman, states the liability to the conscription to 
have continued from the age of 17, to that of 50. xlii. 33 
34. Polybius, a Greek, says ihat the liability extended to 
46 only. vi. 17. I prefer the authority of the former. 



102 

of the youth, to serve as horsemen. The num- 
ber of these knights was considerably augment- 
ed by Servius Tullius, who, when he instituted 
the census, ordained that every plebian citizen 
of irreproachable morals, and possessed of an 
estate of four hundred sestertia^ should be en- 
rolled in the equestrian order. Each Roman 
knight received from the government, at the 
time of his installation, a gold ring and an hoise, 
after which he was bound to perform military 
service, whenever called upon by the state.^ , 



FINIS. 



The reader is requested to correct the following 

ERRATA. 

Page 13, line 1, for tax read lax. — p. 18, 1. 1, for therezd be. — 
p. 20, 1. 2 fr. bottom, for these reacl their -—p. 21, 1. 6, for incont- 
paratively read incomparably. — p. 31,1. 5, insert in before solidum'. 
— p. 34. 1. 4 fr. bottom, for paine read peine. — p. 44, 1. 3, for much 
read must — p. 53, 1. 23, for proclaimed read proclaiming. — p. 59, 
1. 3 fr. bottom for promoerium read pomoerium. — p 80, 1. 7 fr. bot- 
tom, for obstruct read obstructs. — p. 88, 1. 14, for factitious read 
factious, and 1. 9 fr, bottom, for filthy read pitbj. — p. 89, 1. 1, for 
conceit read concert. — p. 90, labt 1. for banners read barriers. 



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